Here we are back in Surrey this campervan morning and returning to as The Members once put it, The Sound of the Suburbs. Not quite old men washing cars or Johnnys punk rock electric guitar. The sounds are of nearby cars, a commuter train, passing unseen planes and the far off relentless hum of the motorway, indeed the sound of the Surrey suburb. The oak has fully leafed, there is wild garden greenness, darting great tits, a singing blackbird somewhere in the branches of the lush oak. A slight breeze rushes through trees, the ash leaves giving their usual shimmer and almost hiss like sound as the breeze passes through. The cloud a blanket of off white above me. There is a chill this morning, given a wee edge with the breeze. A long drive, with the inevitable growth in people, cars and lorry after lorry after lorry the further south we came, until here we are. A wee sense of loss of the freedom of nature and being, but as the poet Munia Khan wrote :
“ The land is always there...it is you who has to return”
I think there is a sentence that sums up the last few weeks, from De Botton once more :
“ There are inner transitions we can’t properly cement without a change of location"
I sense that travel and inner transitions go hand in hand. Perhaps they are just given the space to materialise and bed in, without the interruption of the constant. When I left suburbia it was still coat and hat mornings, but now it’s T-shirt and shorts mornings. The sun threatening to break through already. A flurry of activity, digesting and reflecting on the amazing last 30 days and planning for the next trip into Europe, destination Italy. So travelling from the very north of the UK to the south of Italy. So it’s a flurry of prep and activity before departure. Letting the lessons of the north settle and prepping for the journey south. I feel part of me has to be reminded of Emerson’s around beauty :
“ Though we travel the world over to find the beautiful, we must carry it with us, or we find it not.”
As much as the travel is about experience, adventure and discovery, holding on to the beauty we carry and an awareness of the transitions it brings about feels more important. Lovely days people.
“ Make voyages. Attempt them. There's nothing else. “ Tennesse Williams.
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