Soul Searching

Market Mosque, Marrakesh

Once upon a time...

Twenty years ago, on February 13, 1995, I boarded a one-way swissair flight to Casablanca from JFK, my first stop on solo backpacking trip around the world that would take me from New York to Morocco to Egypt, Israel, India, Nepal, Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, China, and Hong Kong, where on September 1, 1995 I boarded an American flight to Boston, with stops in Narita, Tokyo and Seattle, Wa, which is in fact where this trip all began. Twenty years have passed, and since I am not so much in the habit of getting on one-way flights to anywhere but here, I have decided to revisit this journey. 
I am not sure what format this will take or how often I will post or even if I will maintain the momentum over the next seven months. The reality is that traveling on one’s own is often a dreary, frustrating experience, especially on a really tight budget. I’m not a travel writer, and I am not particularly adventurous (no war zones, war lords, heroin dens, solo camping in the desert, and the like). There’s a lot I just don’t remember about my trip- I look at some of my pictures (very few of which I labeled after the fact of course), and I think where the hell was that and why did I even bother to take that picture, it’s so bad.
I am not even exactly sure why I took the trip in the first place.  It was never like a girlhood dream, like working for an oil company (seriously, those of you who know me know that this is true) or on some kind of list of things to do before you die.  Wasn't a list girl, as you all also know. I met a woman in Seattle who had just come back from a similar venture: she was tall and blond and thin and vivacious and spiritually tuned-in; a result of being in India for a few months, and I thought, wow that sounds cool.  I want to be her, I want to do that. And the seed was planted; though clearly I knew I wouldn’t come back any taller, blonder, thinner or cooler as a person, I actually did think that I would come back spiritually enlightened, that I would get out of the fashion business, that I would get real about my future, that I would become zen and less angsty about life, that I would just become centered and know exactly what to do next. 

How Does It All Turn Out?
Essaouira, March 6, 1995

I would ultimately be disappointed, when upon my return, months after and even years after, it dawned on me that I was exactly the same:  kind of unmoored (some might generously call it a free spirit, but I am not that), totally unwilling to make a long term plan for my life and then follow through. I fell back into fashion and came up with a new plan: to enter the Peace Corps and go to Jordan, which is of course was not a real plan for me but an escape hatch from life. Not that it is not okay to be young and single and free, exploring the world and meeting people, as long as you can pay your own way, but there comes a point when you realize that that just isn't working anymore, and I think this trip was the first attempt to figure it all out.
So, here I am now, making a good faith effort to look back and process and I am really looking forward to seeing how it all turns out.