Travel Buddies

I think most travelers travel for the people. Yes, you’ll get a few tourists who really just want to see some monuments and call it a day, but that’s not your long-term, bit-by-the-travel-bug, I just got home from 6 months abroad and am already planning my next trip, traveler. That’s why travelers sometimes go places that are frankly ugly or uncomfortable. It’s not about the place, per se; it’s about the people.

When I think about my favorite people on earth, a short list comes to mind. On it is a French woman I knew for 4 days in Sao Paulo, an Irish woman with whom I spent 2 days in Ilha Grande, some Canadian climbers who helped me pass 2 days in Lima, an American with whom I passed one lovely evening in Barcelona, an Australian journalist whom I accompanied to a nightclub that same night, an Iraqi war vet in the Bay area whom I circled round but never got to know particularly well, and then the more traditional choices, my sister, college and high school friends, former colleagues. But how can that be? How was it that I connected with someone on such a deep level, for a period of 2-5 days, knowing we would never see each other again? How can someone with whom I spent 15 hours be on the same list as a best friend of 15 years?

Counterintuitively, I think the shortness of the time period is a contributing factor. I sometimes find it hard to confide in a person who lives in my hometown. If I show them my vulnerabilities, I then have to see them around all the time and fear they might judge me for whatever secret I shared. And so I say to myself, maybe it’s better to keep that particular story locked up.

But when I travel, I can open up. I can tell a complete stranger about my illnesses and my fears. I can openly say what I despise and love about my country, I can say what I am ashamed of and proud of in being an American.

The reason I know it’s not just me is that I see this expressed in traveler’s blog posts, Instagram shout-outs, Facebook statutes. After we travel, we have no good way to thank our travel buddies. Why say “I want to be your best friend” to someone you’ll never see again? Why say “I love you”? It’s probably true, but what’s the point? There is no future there. We only just met. And yet those are the people who changed me. They are the ones who showed me a world other than the one into which I was born. Those people that I talked to for 10 hours taught me more about myself and this world than people I have known for 10 years.

As time passes, I remember the conversations we had in more detail than the ones I have with people on a regular basis. I remember the table setting, the flowers, the wine we drank, the way the waiter hit on us, I remember what you told me about your ex-boyfriend, I remember details of your face when I couldn’t remember a face I saw ten minutes ago in torts class, I remember that you were fearless, having broken into a new industry in a foreign country, I remember your mix of maturity and childishness, I remember your yellow shoes. And I remember changing. I remember my attitudes, my beliefs, my assumptions, my plans for the future, my priorities, my dreams, changing. I remember my world expanding in the course of a dinner.

Of course I love my fellow travelers. How could I not? They changed me. They changed my mind, my heart, my soul, even if we only spent a heartbeat together.