Satire

An average day will start precisely at 7 am. Scuffling slippers find the way to the kitchen, the well-trodden path to the coffee pot. Take a sip or two, and then the day begins. You will leisurely head off to work knowing exactly how long it will take to arrive. Don’t bother thinking twice about things; everything is the same as it was yesterday. While it can be leisurely and kicked back, life still has a way of sending a couple of irregular days down your way, so why would anyone take the road to more calamities? What is so alluring about travel?

The average travel nut is a restless sort; most of them have probably gotten into a brawl with the law. They cut it out for themselves the moment they stepped outside of ‘ordinary’ and into the ‘wilderness of the unknown’. Constantly not thinking to plan a schedule, just get up and go when you feel like it. How is anything going to be achieved? Impromptu planning may work for some, but it never built a civilized society.

The bulk of citizenry is a well-to-do crowd with respectable jobs, homes, and families to look after. Nobody respectable can afford the frivolous notion of running around abroad. You can have all the fun that a young troublemaker can get without leaving the convenience of a continent. Life is nestled in a common routine: language, people, and places. All is non-intimidating and familiar. A deep connection is felt with everyone and everything you see. Being firmly rooted in one society forever, there is such an amazing sense of self-esteem, confidence, and pride that continually builds. Some would give up such a priceless feature for the destructive and unpredictable beast called voyaging.

From a family perspective, it is one home forever or a key part of childhood is lost. Pick up young roots, and they are sure to weaken or die from the callous treatment. A youth must be nurtured gently in a familiar soil to grow strong, deep roots. Children should never have to go through the constant pick up and drop off through dozens of locations.

Think of how easy it is to order a meal, to send a package, or to drive places? Simple, painless, and taken for granted. Decide to pick up and leave, a guaranteed mess awaits! Change of address forms, packing, planning, flights, and baggage that “must be less than fifty pounds”. The list only just begins. Then you arrive, and the trouble is only warming up. Getting kids in a new school; meeting the neighbors; unpacking everything; reporting lost baggage.

The list of mishaps could keep going forever, and still some wacky person scrambles past the rolls of paper for the first flight to “anywhere except here”. We have to see this or that thing half way across the world before we die. It is the harsh reality we live in; everyone is in a hurry to get away. Try as you will to leave home, but home will never leave you.