Cold Feet

The most common reaction when I tell people my travel plan is to be impressed. Most harbor the desire to chuck it all and go somewhere exotic. It’s very romantic. They’re fascinated to see someone actually doing it. Doesn’t that take a lot of courage?

It didn’t take me a lot of courage. Saying so is not humility, it’s perspective: traveling without a lot of savings, without severance money, with kids — all these would take much more fearlessness than I need to muster.

But it does take some courage. I still feel some fear. Rightly so. Fear and uncertainty are part of the reason to do this in the first place. It’s something new and different. If you don’t feel some fear you’ll also be too numb to feel the joy of it.

This fear is not constant. Often I feel completely certain and confident. Why not? I’ve plenty of resources behind me. Yet there are times where something jolts me. Some thought, some memory, opens things up a crack. Fear slips in. Worry. What if I miss something important? What if my certainty and confidence are simply masks for the laziness of not taking this seriously? Complacency. What kind of delusions make me think this is something I can do?

Here are three examples. By chance a few days ago I happened by my mailbox to pick up mail for the last time. It was just something added to my errands because it happened to be convenient. No big deal if I didn’t do it; mail’s going to be piling up for months. One of the letters was the form I need to enroll to extend my (employer covered) health care. It expires in 60 days. Without my unplanned mail check, it’s possible I would have returned without insurance. A nightmare for folks living in America.

Another example: while driving the other morning, I got a phone call from the fraud detection unit of my bank, regarding one of the credit cards I’ll be using on the road. Did I authorize a $0 transaction in Atlanta? No… I don’t think so. $0, is that a thing? Oh, it happens to be at the same date and time as my travel insurance purchase? Maybe it’s part of the same transaction. Maybe not. Agent doesn’t think so. Thoughts of arranging a new card, getting it sent to Bangkok, not knowing where to send it since my initial booking is only for 3 days. All this brought the fear and anxiety back.

Finally last might I misplaced a bag with my wallet and all my US money for the trip. More panicking. More self-recriminations. How can I travel the world if I can’t keep track of some simple possessions? Clearly I’m not taking this seriously if I can lose such vital things as my money and my wallet. My rented room is in a place so rural and safe that the doors are never locked — how can I possibly be ready for the real world?

There are many other examples. Stories about people who can’t find jobs, worries about what cards I’ll use to get cash while over there, the list goes on and on.

These events spin my mind up to thinking about all the other things I could be missing. I tell myself I’m comfortable with all the known risks of travel — theft, disease, injury, protracted unemployment upon my return — but what about these unknown ones?

Brief moments of cold feet. They pass. Now I’m no longer focusing on everything that could go wrong. Maybe they pass too easily. If this trip ends in some unlikely catastrophe, how will I feel about my airy nonchalance now? How will I feel about accepting everyone’s impressed little noises at my — as yet entirely speculative — story? This is an additional fear bred by the feeling of real danger: the added fear of doing something stupid. Being foolish.

As I’m reminded here as the temperature drops below freezing that cold feet are natural. The world isn’t always warm. Contact with it won’t always be pleasant. And my purpose here is to experience the world as it is.

It’s when you stop being able to feel your cold feet that you should really be scared.