Travel Neurosis

You know, I haven't been back home for four days and already I'm planning my next vacation.  After all the whining and complaining I put you my poor readers through about Mexico here I want to do this again.  But not in Mexico, but in Colombia, of course in Colombia.  It will be better in Colombia than Mexico which is full of Mexicans, maybe because Colombia will be full of Colombians?  Or maybe this suggests that I am never completely happy wherever I happen to be?  Well, fairly happy anyway.  Okay, content.  I am probably now going to look on the Internet for everything I can learn about Colombia, especially Bogota which is my preferred destination.  Don't get me wrong.  I am happy here in dull, dreary, wet, soggy, chilly, uncultured and drab Vancouver which after all is my home.  I love it here, so don't get me wrong, but I love it even more if I can get away for a month every year.  You would not catch me planning to spend eleven months abroad, nor six and not even three months.  Maybe two max, but one month seems perfect.  It is just enough time to get good and homesick so that by the time the plane lands at YVR I am ready to kiss the tarmac, walk joyously in the cold and open rain and rhapsodize on the wonder of good drinkable tap water, drivers who stop for pedestrians, comfortable buses and transit trains, wide sidewalks that are not cracked and broken everywhere and no little old ladies begging on them.  And of course cherry blossoms and rhododendrons.
     Living in the same city for many years is almost like feeling stranded in a marriage that is going nowhere.  You think, maybe if I had an annual fling, just for one month, to spice everything up, eleven months of sharing the bed with Mr. or Mrs. Boring won't seem so bad after all, and at times might even be downright enjoyable.  Except, on principal I do not approve of open marriages so Dan Savage is not to be trusted on this matter.  But you know, maybe more marriages would survive if each partner, not going so far as to actually cheat, but maybe could take a month off from everyone, spouse and family.  So that, say, the Missus, or the Mister if you happen to be part of a same sex couple, could take off to France in April, and in January the Mister, or the Ms., could go backpacking in Costa Rica.  They would each have two months away from each other and one full month away from the little bratlings if there happen to be any, and Bob's yer uncle.  In case they can't budget for France or Costa Rica, how about Vancouver Island and Kamloops?  Or they could get really creative about it and stay in a bed and breakfast in a different neighbourhood.
     Really, this being able to travel every year is a huge privilege and I never know if this year is going to be the last because, well you know, shit happens and one of these years the money just might not be available and then what am I going to do.  Stay home and enjoy the full cycle of seasons and kick back and relax while March inaugurates the gentle and frustratingly slow transition from winter to spring.