Cornering

Corner: vb; to abruptly acknowledge one's locational cluelessness, halt abruptly  (typically on a corner where signs with English lettering can be found), and pull out a map, while bemoaning your obvious tourist status. Usually accompanied by elements of awe and disbelief when one finds their place on the map, yet the actual getting there remains utter mystery. Used in a sentence: "Hope, do we need to corner?"

So, Hope and I are wandering around Thailand this month. We don't have tight plans--any plans, really... we have a similar travel philosophy, and that is that travel--and life, really--should center on BEING, not DOING.

This morning we woke up, cried over spicy food (hello Northern Thailand!), bought a few essentials of life  (e.g. water and kitkats), and sought the perfect journal spot--one that was shaded, not awkward, and had a clean place to sit. After much cornering, we found the perfect spot to squat on--the grounds of a hospital adjacent the river.  Asian House Martin's and various flowerpeckers and sunbirds were worthy distractions, but I found myself thinking about travel, and on being a tourist.

Does anyone actually enjoy fitting the tourist stereotype  (for we ALL do), or do we just poke fun at other tourists while ignoring the elephant in the room? (That is, no matter how much we deny it, our actions and pursuits on vacation differ from those who call our destination "home"). What's wrong with being a tourist, anyway?

For that matter, why do we crave travel? To answer questions?  To elevate ourselves in comparison to less-cultured homebodies? Is it in search of rediscovering that sense of childlike wonder?

Save paltry 2-week breaks, Hope and I have been full-time slaves to work and school for the last two years. This trip represents the breaking of that cycle,  the defiance to societal pressures that barricade introspection. Long vacations are so important.  It takes time to disconnect from those demands and space to re-evaluate where I'm at--career, relationships, general well-being.

Hope and I were talking on the train to Chiang Mai.  After we left Bangkok Station--but before we crossed the rice paddies and their assortment of Asian Openbills, Red - wattled Lapwings, and White-throated kingfishers, we'd already hit the philosophy.
"Some people live their lives in circles, but I'd rather live linearally...always moving forward."
I nodded, ruminating on the thought but not entirely agreeing.
"You know, I actually like the idea of living life in a spiral. That way, you're ever-expanding, yet also revisiting where you came from,  connecting new experiences with the things you've always known."
My spiral contains so much cornering that it must defy all geometric laws, but in life--like in navigating Chiang Mai--sometimes you've just got to stop to confirm you're on the right track.