I’ve been on a travel kick this summer. After finals I went on a road trip from Saint Paul, Minnesota (where Macalester College, my home institution, is located) to Vancouver, Washington, with plenty of stops and meanderings in-between.
Oregon Coast 
Cannon Beach, Oregon 
Black Hills 
Badlands 
Drive into Yellowstone 
Bison (so close!) at Old Faithful 
Roadside stop
Afterwards, instead of going home to Vermont, I decided to sublet in Saint Paul so I could work full-time on campus, and to use that opportunity to live properly away from home for the first time.
Views during a Mississipi River run 
Storm rolling in above Macalester 
Mill City Ruins in Minneapolis 
Perplexed at Lake Nokomis (1 out of 11,842 lakes in Minnesota)
I’ll be taking a brief trip before hopping on my flight to Copenhagen (ending literally a day before the flight, so rest in peace my time to prep and R&R). There’s a lot of momentum leading up to August 17th, and I can see myself being propelled by that for a good while.
Most of my significant traveling has been two-week long media making road trips, so getting the most of out traveling at times feels like it should include documentation, interviews, art, and in-depth intellectual inquiry along the way. I doubt I’ll be going on as many of those as I used to, and as I keep traveling I’m having to reconsider– what does meaningful travel look like to me?
I’m sure this little research question will change over time, especially as my upcoming semester in Copenhagen passes by. But I can give you my preliminary thoughts.
I love when I can build a relationship between myself and a place. For example, I feel at home in the forests of Vermont, in part because I used to carry a local plant guide wandering the woods around my house. Knowing the plants and animals made me feel less like a passing intruder because I felt more of a personal familiarity among them. Now, in my interloping, I sometimes like to take pictures or notes on plants I come across so I can look them up later. I learn how and why it grows there. In the same vein, being greeted by a new landscape within even an hour of driving in North America keeps me wanting to travel just another hour more, and then another. The size of the horizon, the texture of the air, the varieties of moss growing on the undersides of branches, the color and viscosity of soil, the brutality or softness of mountains. There are always more combinations to see.There’s more intricate natural logic to learn about, or even just lazily, dreamily guess at. It removes anonymity and disconnect between me and the natural world.
In the same vein, doing interviews while traveling lends an analogous experience. Every place is home to people who were either brought up there or they were drawn there for some reason, and for however long, they decided to stay. And this isn’t limited to interviews– people kind enough to let us stay at their homes or lodgings, people we met on the street while asking for directions, shop owners, and so on. The most interesting people to get to know embrace a mutuality with their surroundings, aware of what they receive and offering what they can.
So basically, I’m thinking about how to make the most of this semester. In the grand scheme of things, it’s a blip. And for sure, I will have a minimal impact on the city of Copenhagen (or even on the street I’ll be living at in my shared apartment). But for the 5-ish months I’ll be there, this semester envelops my daily life, and I’ll be a part of some network of people still mostly unknown to me. Am I excited? Yes! For what? I don’t know! I can’t trust myself to predict that! I’m excited to be excited by something!
Am I nervous? I don’t know, I don’t think so. I have a healthy awareness of the uncertainties I have. I’ve grown to not be the type to ruminate on or catastrophize uncertainty though, which I’m thankful for. I don’t know the ropes yet and any plan or expectation I have is probably going to be blown out of the water as soon as I touch down. I’m just here to do the best I possibly can, whatever that looks like.
Anyway, with less meandering, the best and simplest way I can put it is this. I’m looking forward to learning, both about the things I’m passionate about (Economics! Urban planning!) and generally about (things I again cannot predict) Copenhagen, Denmark, and Europe. I’m looking forward to have little pockets of familiarity in places I’m currently wholly unfamiliar with. I’m excited to miss the people and places I’ll become familiar with in Copenhagen when I do fly back home. The act of giving and receiving, and the sense of gain and loss following departure, that to me is indicative of time well spent.
A Detour in Denmark 