Not Intent on Arriving

Pretty hard to believe that two weeks of my five week jaunt through Italy is done. My group is amazing and appears to be getting along very well together. Right now, we’re finishing our final day in Cortona, a beautiful Tuscan town set high in the mountains and close to two dorment volcanoes.

Our trip has been full of delicious food, wonderful day trips and so much more. I hope to write more in the coming days when we arrive in our homestays. We’ll be in the southern town of Cosenza in Calabria. I’ve never been there so that’s exciting. It’s also right by the beach. Should be fun. Here’s to the eight hour tn tomorrow. See you on the other side.

Tomorrow I head off to Europe, meeting my group of 12 high school students at JFK.  We’ll take an overnight plane to Paris, and then, following an epic 7-hour layover, land in Rome. I’ve been tasked with planning a number of activities over these coming days.  Scavenger hunts to have the kids expl0re the city, lots of information to explanation and dozens of fun games to play.

I’ve had to make a change in my travel philosophy this summer.  I’ll have to develop more patience first and foremost, but above all else, I’ll have to become less selfish. It sounds weird and I don’t think of myself as overly selfish, but I have to make sure I’m doing whatever we’re doing for the kids.  So that has led me to reorient myself for the summer.  Hence, I’m here in Brattleboro.

These past couple of days of training (it’s really only been 4 days) have been jam-packed.  Around 80 of us, from across the country and at various points in our lives, descended on Brattleboro to learn how we are supposed to care for these kids this summer.  Thankfully, many of the leaders were returning and offered their words and wisdom from trips led during summers past.

It’s interesting to be in a place with so many like-minded people.  Everyone collected here wants to travel.  We want to travel more.  We’re hungry for the adventure, the unplanned, the unrehearsed.  It’s been nice to hear from so many other people just like that aren’t sure what this coming fall will bring.  They all share the sense that life is a journey and planning it out too much would be a waste.

So tomorrow at 8 a.m. I will begin a new journey.  Tasked, this time, with bringing the magic of being abroad to the eyes of 12 young people, hungry to see the world.

Every time I set out on a trip, a start out with extremely lofty goals for myself.  Goals in the past have included:

1. Take more than 1,000 pictures (I’m not sure why this was a goal).

2. Write in a journal every day with the most important observations (I usually succeeded in this recurring goal for a couple days before failing)

3. Making sure to bring back appropriate souveniers that are “authentic” and represent my experience (I could never find the right gifts or would leave someone out).

4. Go without the internet (I’m addicted, may as well face it).

I’ve failed at all of these. So this time around I’ve adopted a new approach, and hopefully one I can keep up.  I’m introducing “Not Intent on Arriving” as a blog most immediately for the trip to Italy I’m about to lead, but, if all goes well, I’d like to continue to use it into real life.  Now, to address the questions you may have.

What trip to Italy, Anthony? Tomorrow, I head back to Vermont (less than two weeks after stupidly asking myself when I would be back) for training by the Experiment in International Living. Then, on June 28, I and 12 high school students from across the country well set out from New York on a five-week exploration of Italy.  We will cover a lot of territory; the trip stretches from Venice to Calabria in the far south.  One of the highlights for the kids should be a 2-week homestay in Cosenza (picture below). I’m pretty excited for the whole thing.  Should be an adventure.

Which takes me to the second question you’re probably all asking.  Why did you pick that name for the blog?  I struggled over names for a needlessly long time.  I looked for something cute to do with my name.  Thankfully, I had lots of experience from school with bad puns on my name.  So I ruled such names out.  I remembered a quote from an old debate speech (of all places).  I don’t remember the context exactly, but I remember quoting this ancient philosopher Lao Tzu.  I really like the full quote: “A good traveler has no fixed plans, and is not intent on arriving.“

This accurately reflects my view on traveling.  Heading to this summer should test my philosophy because we will have fixed goals and expectations, but I hope to impart some of this philosophy to my kids.  Rather than planning out every millisecond of every day, I like to go with the flow and just explore.  Goals are fine, but not making it to them should not be the end of the world.  Instead, the fun should be on getting there.  If you never arrive, you should feel happy nevertheless.

That’s the plan anyway.  We’ll see what happens. I’ll keep you posted along the way.