TRAVEL
Big Time Traveler - Yet I’ve Never *Truly* Travelled
My dreams will come true
I love to travel. Truly, I do. Growing up in Northern New Jersey, I was your typical suburban girl growing up in the USA. My dream was to travel abroad; specifically, I wanted to travel to Europe.
Europe is the place where dreams come true. It’s the place where Lizzy McGuire, the characters from Murder Mystery, and the cast of Bridgeton have their wild experiences, fall madly in love, and adventure of a lifetime. (Can you tell I like watching Netflix?)
Europe, over all of its many draws, is the place to experience the best of what life’s got to offer. In my opinion, at least. Ironic, since I’ve never been there. In fact, I’ve never even gone outside the country. But I AM indeed a traveller, right?
Growing up, traveling meant going three hours north to Upstate New York, staying in an AirBnB in Pennsylvania, or if it’s a really big trip, flying to Florida or Arizona. To me, that always was traveling. But in a sense, I now am not sure how much of “traveling” that really was.
This is not to say that I am not incredibly grateful for every experience outside my home state. I have incredible memories of visiting various parts of the United States that I wouldn’t change for the world. However, is it really TRAVELING?
Travel, by definition of Merriam Webster dictionary, is a journey especially to a distant or unfamiliar place. To me, the United States isn’t distant. Distance is going to a completely different country, with different laws, and a different culture. There are smaller cultural divisions inside the United States; sure, but it truly does not compare to a whole different country.
Like Ariel from the Little Mermaid wishes to be on land, I wish to experience different lands. Because of my big dreams and the fact that I have actually gone outside my home state, I will still consider myself a traveler, who has *truly* never traveled.
