Rolf Potts on “the hum of possibility” that long term travel provides:
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The “hum of possibility” is the feeling that anything can happen at any moment ”” a heady openness to the new and unexpected. It’s hard to experience this feeling at home, since home life is made more efficient and manageable by certain self-insulating patterns and routines. That’s why at home we fall into these little rituals of low-stakes possibility, like going to bars to meet people, or dabbling in new fads or hobbies. That’s all great; I’m not knocking the patterns of home-life. But on the road the potential for new experience is so much more powerful and real. You can challenge yourself: reeducate yourself, reconsider yourself, reinvent yourself if you want to. Embracing this sense of challenge and newness ”” which may be nothing more complicated than wandering off the obvious tourist trail ”” can send your worldview and even your outlook on life into new directions. It’s a somewhat intimidating, yet invariably intoxicating feeling that follows you as you travel.
The man is nothing if not eloquent on all things travel.