Thinking About Leaving and Unexpected Adventures

I'm up early after not enough sleep, sipping tea and waiting for breakfast to finish on the stove. There's not a sound on the street. There's a little birdsong, but not as much as I expect to hear this time of day. Maybe they're taking a holiday as well.

I notice someone has put out the trash. It's Memorial Day so they'll be bringing it back in again. I can never remember which holidays have a next-day pick-up and which don't, so I watch the neighbors to see what they do. I won't this evening, of course, I'll be far away.

I have a list of things to pack and attend to. I'm just about done with it. There's a bit of tidying to do and I watered most of the plants last night. I need to decide what clothes to bring. I always bring too many. I like choices. I'll be at the beach for two days and traveling for four more to split the driving, so I really don't need to bring much, and I probably won't be wearing too many clothes while I'm there. Usually what happens on a trip like this is I put on something I like and wear it over and over again. Last time I ordered white cotton slub-knit long sleeve tee shirts from Old Navy I bought two of them. That, and a pair of jeans, will probably be all I bring, well, and something nice to wear, just in case. I would live in white cotton and denim if I could. 

Flip flops. Don't forget those. And sunscreen. Didn't I clean out my linen closet so I could find things more easily? But now I don't know where anything is. 

All of this should be easy. Simple. Nothing to worry over or to think too much about. I remind myself. It's an affirmation. And as my mother always says of travel. "You're not going to the North Pole. You can pick up anything you forget." I've changed the first sentence of this paragraph to 

All of this is easy.

A couple of weeks ago I had no idea I'd be traveling today. I was wondering when I'd be able to do that again, as so many of us are. Perhaps my wondering was a seed I planted. Here it is, popping its little green head up out of the earth, beckoning. 

A Hundred Days of Happiness is a daily writing practice that opens a landscape of discovery into my own human experience. 

Katherine Cartwright has been blogging since 2012, and every year brings new wonder. She asks big questions of the small things in life.