One Month to Turkey

The traveler was active; he went strenuously in search of people, of adventure, of experience. The tourist is passive; he expects interesting things to happen to him. He goes "sight-seeing." ~Daniel J. Boorstin

It is one month to the day before the plane takes off for Turkey with me as one of it's passengers, one month to the day before I leave the West and land the next day in a country that bridges the West and the East, in a country which has been both West and East, Christian and Muslim.

This is a trip I eagerly anticipate both for the wonder of visiting a new country and because I will be with an experienced traveling companion, someone that has set foot in many countries and has a knack for seeing the world in ways obscured by my vision. I can normally see the obvious but am not privy to the visions of a poet. My companion is a poet, one who sees beneath the surface, sees that which is beyond the purveyance of the mortal. I am excited for this trip for she will open to me a world previously beyond my comprehension.

We will, at times, be off the beaten path. When we come to a fork in the road, I expect her to edge me toward the road less taken, I expect her to drag me to those places where the real Turkey will appear before our eyes, the Turkey that does not cater to the common tourist. The naked Turkey unencumbered by the veil that attracts the common tourist.

I am excited for this trip for I expect a new door to be open, a new page turned in the book of my life. I expect this book to have many such pages in the future each with a marvelous story to tell. I am excited for my mind will be forever changed, forever freed of a few of the preconceptions that hinder my ability to understand life on this planet.