Bless Me Father, For I Am Travelling

I spent the better part of yesterday morning reading back over my blogs from camp and the earlier posts of my travels around America. I do this every now and again, as narcisistic as that might seem. Sometimes it's to torture myself at how much I still miss Appel Farm and the friends I made there. Sometimes it's to comfort myself. Sometimes it's to gain a little perspective.

I've been in Canada for two months now and consider myself fairly settled.  I have friends who are more like family, a job that drags my butt out of bed each day and a local pub where the bouncer no longer bothers to check my ID. I don't have to plan how or where I'm going to get my dinner each night or fight for a position in front of the stove in a hostel kitchen. I have my own kitchen cupboard and a shelf in the fridge and cooking a healthy dinner for myself remains a blessing I can count. In all respects, I feel like I've established a life in Banff.

Which is why I return to my blog posts every now and again - to remind myself that as settled as I might be, I am still a traveller. My feet might be grounded for six months, my backpack empty and stored in the cupboard beneath the stairs, its contents easily accesible in my bedroom closet. But just like when I was jumping buses every other day, bound for a new city with temporary friends and uncomfortable hostel beds, I should still be waking up each morning with that zeal for travelling, that appreciation for everything around me and everything I am experiencing, no matter how settled I might feel.

I remembered this yesterday when I was boarding at Sunshine. I was walking to the gondola with a snowboard under one arm and the snow beneath my feet and I remembered how removed I am from the life I was living in Sydney. Once upon a time I was sitting at my kitchen table struggling to believe I would ever be able to tell travel stories like my family and now travel stories are my reality. Tomorrow, I will go to work on a snow-capped mountain in a country on the other side of the world to my own.

Tomorrow is another day of travelling.

Ciao for now. xo