Once a Traveler, Always a Traveler
Today, I’m on my way to Las Vegas for a work conference. When I got to the airport, a happy nostalgia washed over me. I was the protagonist of a movie, walking through a familiar location with fuzzy memories appearing all around me. There, in the check-in lobby, 12-year-old Sarah chatters excitedly with other eighth graders on their way to the Grand Canyon. At security, I see the tears I quickly wiped away when my dad kissed my cheek, seeing me off on my first international flight alone to study abroad. I watch my whole family run through the airport, sweatshirts slipping from around out waists, dreams of Disney in our hearts. Further along, a much older Sarah sits with Nora at a restaurant nervously going through a mental checklist for a three week European excursion.
The high glass ceilings of the Richmond airport, the ads for foreign destinations, even the smell of airport cinnabons fill me with wanderlust. I feel as if i could go anywhere. In a weird way, traveling puts me on ease. I no longer have to worry about the chores and to do lists of home. I’m allowed to peruse the Skymall catalog and laugh at the ridiculous products without guilt. And I know a new place awaits me at the end of my day of traveling. A new skyline to digest, a new transit system to learn, a new language - or at least accent - to listen to.
My love of travel is easy to see in my decorating preferences. One glance at my home decoration inspiration board will reveal a plethora of ways to use maps and globes in your home - wallpaper, pillows, furniture decoupaging, heck maybe even a map doggy bed.
When I got back from my first trip abroad in Italy in 2011, I saved all of my maps and brochures from the trip and waited to find a good way to keep the memories alive. That summer was the summer of trunks. I found the first trunk at an estate sale. It was dirt cheap - my handy dandy daddy told me the hardware alone would cost $20 if you were to go about building this sturdy trunk. I got it for $20. Can you say CHA - CHING? I scrubbed and painted the body and used those souvenirs to decorate the top. I added a stenciled "ITALIA" to bring the green onto the top. After about four-thousand seven-hundred and three coats of Mod Podge and Polyurethane, it was done.
For two years, the trunk sat under my window sill and hosted my little Walmart Bonsai Tree named Albert in my college apartment room. Now, it's my coffee table in my very first apartment. I'm so pleased with how it's held up and it never fails to remind me of sunny skies and chianti. Here's to more travel-inspired projects in the future.
For now, whether you’re going down a new road in your town or across the globe, traveling is just one more way to Dabble on, y’all!