What I Was Doing While You Were Breeding

by Kristin Newman

I wanted love, but I also wanted freedom and adventure, and those two desires fought like angry obese sumo wrestlers in the dojo of my soul.

And I began to need my trips like other people need religion.

You say yes because it is the only way to really experience another place, and let it change you. Which, in my opinion, is the mark of a great trip.

life is an endless series of choosing between two things you want almost equally. And you have to evaluate and determine which awesome thing you want infinitesimally more, and then give up that other awesome thing you want almost exactly as much. You have to trade awesome for awesome. Everyone I knew, no matter what they chose, was at least a little in mourning for that other thing.

When you travel you’re forced to have new thoughts. “Is this alley safe?” “Is this the right bus?” “Was this meat ever a house pet?” It doesn’t even matter what the new thoughts are, it feels so good to just have some variety. And it’s a reboot for your brain.

You’re interviewing. And from your first date, you’re focusing, apparently, on only three questions: Do we want the same things out of life? Do we bring out the best in each other? Do we find each other attractive? That’s it. In that order.

The delicious feeling of being part of it, of really living a normal life in a totally exotic place.