The trip comes back to me in a montage of memories that take me from one place to another in no chronologically correct order – just random snapshots of our trip tumbling through my head like a poorly organized, fast paced slide show. I’ll be in a cozy café on a side street in damp Bergen where we’ve taken shelter with schoolwork and strong espresso amid great art and new friends, then to a chaotic street in Kolkata, India, onto a secluded beach along Portugal’s wild Atlantic coastline, and so forth. The images stream as long as I let them. And I always do let them – I never want these spontaneous trips down this fantastic memory road to end just as I never wanted the trip itself to end. My heart aches for it the way hearts do for love affairs that have come to an undesired end. The reminiscing is a way to somehow keep it alive. I can't let this trip's significance fade over time because I know, in my heart, that it is one of the most amazing things I’ll do in my life.
Two years ago at this time we were still in the early stages of the trip. We were in Turkey about now and I remember how for Sam and Will the idea of journeying for another eight months seemed like an eternity. Of course, when we talk about the trip today what typically gets mentioned is how fast it went and how we wish we had appreciated that more at the time. It seems easy in the middle of life to say that life is short, maybe not so for kids. Yet I think both Sam and Will have a better sense of life’s shortness after witnessing, so intensely, the speed at which these ten months of traveling went by. Just one of many lessons learned along the way. We can use it to remind each other on a regular basis to not take what’s right in front of us for granted.
Our reference points of time and our movement through it have changed as well. To be so far from home without the ability to return to it quickly was something that took getting used to. I took Sam up to a hockey tournament in Boise, Idaho last weekend – about a five-hour drive from our house. It occurred to me as we anticipated the drive home, sort of dreading it, that at least we would be sleeping in our own beds that night. For ten months we traveled further and further away from our beds. Depending on the particular mode of transportation, a 21 hour train ride for instance, the great sense of distance we felt from home had more to do with the arduousness of travel. Our London to Mumbai flight on the other hand created a totally different "distance" sensation. Though the flight was long, it was stepping off the plane into such pure exotica that made each of us feel instantly, desperately far from home. It's probably safe to say that while we were in India and Nepal the feeling of being far, far from home never left us. It's funny, but we talk often about returning to places like New Zealand like it's no further than the drive to Boise. I wish it were only a five-hour drive to many of the places I think about so often from our trip. In any case, I would trade my own bed in a heartbeat to return to the sights and sounds and voices we encountered all around the world.
It was while we were in Turkey that I learned my dad had cancer. A month later, when we had set up our first "base camp" in Barcelona, I made a five-day trip back to see him and my mom at their home in New Hampshire. I remember how hard it was to separate myself from Anne and Will and Sam – to leave "the pack," and interrupt the rhythm we had established in just a few months of traveling. I also remember how bizarre America felt to me when I arrived in Boston. It started with CNN on TVs scattered throughout the terminals at Logan International Airport. It only got worse during an emergency visit to a mall for some much needed trip supplies. It was important to do this trip - to spend time with Dad especially since it was just a week after he had major surgery and a week before he would begin chemotherapy. I asked him if I should stay longer but he insisted that I continue with the trip – he was enjoying this blog and living vicariously through our adventure. When it came time for me to leave, he and my mom took me to catch a bus back to Logan. As I was getting ready to board the bus and we were saying our goodbyes, my eyes met my dad's with the question; would we ever see each other again? When I rejoined Anne and the boys in Barcelona we made a decision to dedicate the trip to him. Dad lived another two and a half years. Before he died this past August we had several opportunities to share more stories of our travels with him. He seemed to love hearing them. Dad was always a great support to me when I was off adventuring during earlier years. He always seemed to get it.
I was with my dad when he died. During the last two weeks of his life I spent a lot of time at his bedside thinking about our relationship and what it was like being a son to him. Among the things we had in common, not the least which was playing and exploring in the outdoors, was something I didn’t get into until well into my adult years (this is going to sound so terribly cliché); motorcycles. As a child, I would love to hear my dad’s stories about his adventures and misadventures on his motorcycles. He had a way of leaving a lot to my imagination and to this day I have pictures in my head of the roads he traveled down and of the different bikes he traveled them on. When it was announced that there would be a memorial service for dad in September, I decided that a fitting tribute would be to ride my motorcycle to it. It turned into a 5600-mile trip. It was worth every one of them. I rode with a picture of my mom and dad on their honeymoon in 1950 riding on a beautiful '49 Matchless. I had it tucked into a window sleeve meant for maps on top of my tank bag. It made for good conversation along the route with other bikers and even customs officers when I crossed into and out of Canada. It also provided me with much needed inspiration in the fifteenth or sixteenth hours of what were many excruciatingly long days on the bike. I loved the trip. I loved that it didn’t make any difference if I hadn't completely worked out the complexities of father/son relationships by the end of it. What I know is that he and I shared a love of motorcycles and I know I added something to his later years when I would tell him about my own adventures, and my misadventures. My stories never left much to the imagination, mine always had photographs accompanying them, like the one that shows up here in Ontario, Canada, midway through my ride to the memorial service.
As I write this I have no idea if anyone will visit our blog and read it. The trip ended more than a year ago and we haven't added anything here in the last several months. I just felt compelled to get something on paper about it at this time - just my way of keeping it close to my heart - keeping it important.
Ron
