Dave's Travel Journals
Quack!
L'Isle-sur-la-Sorgue, France: August 8, 2002
By Dave Fox
I'm in Provence, in a village with a typically long, flowing French name: L'Isle sur la Sorgue. "The Island on the River Sorgue." I have been here two days and I have yet to confirm that this town is really an island. Actually, I am skeptical.
But I'm skeptical of just about everything today. It's a familiar feeling: traveler's burnout.
My friends in America get annoyed when I complain that I'm in Europe and depressed. They are stealthily reading my e-mail at work, ears perked for any approaching boss-like movement. They're living normal lives -- "day jobs" we writers call them -- the things we're not supposed to quit. My friends don't want to hear that I'm in France and it sucks. I understand.
But I'm lonely. I've been driving around this foreign country for the last week, remembering wistfully back to when I was 20. Then, solo travel was a non-stop carnival. There were always surrogate friends -- other lone travelers who slept in youth hostel beds next to mine. I don't stay in youth hostels anymore. That's probably my mistake. I can afford hotels now, complete with my own personal toilet. I choose comfort over companionship. Then I whine that I'm lonely.
I'm sitting alone at dinner, at a restaurant overlooking the River Sorgue, when a duck swims by. The duck quacks -- louder than I've ever heard a duck quack.
"QUACK!" it quacks. Then it quacks again. "QUACK! QUACK!!!!"
There's an urgency in its quacking. It reminds me of last winter when I had bronchitis and I worried my coughing was waking my neighbors.
"QUACK QUACK QUACK QUACK QUACK!!!!"
People are staring now at the loud duck, but the duck will not stop quacking.
And why should he? He's a duck, and he's doing what ducks are supposed to do. Loudly.
"Hey people!" he is thinking as he circles the swell in the river below the restaurant. "Here I am! I am a duck! And I am quacking! Hello!"
This duck has no inhibitions and I'm jealous. I want to quack. Loudly. That would feel good right now. No searching for the right words to express my emotions. Just a long string of uninhibited quacks until I'm too exhausted to quack anymore. But I don't want to get kicked out of the restaurant, so instead I quietly nibble my chocolate mousse.
I haven't been home since late May. It's August now. My two pairs of pants, both new when I left Seattle, are falling apart. But as I sit here fantasizing about quacking like a duck, I realize my falling-apart trousers are probably a minor concern compared to my sanity.
I'm in a remote French village tonight. Tomorrow I drive for several hours, fly for several hours, and sleep in Oslo. Monday I fly some more and Wednesday I drive to work -- to my "day job" in Seattle.
Something always feels out of place when I first return to my American home. It feels like someone's been tampering with my stuff. But in reality, my mess has just been sitting there, undisturbed, while I transplanted myself to another continent.
Right now, I'm craving that mess. I'm craving my bed. I have not spent more than three nights in the same bed since May.
So I hope you'll forgive me for whining about France and allow me my desire to quack. I know it's not normal. But being normal is overrated.
We all have something in our lives we would like to quack about, but we repress that urge. You probably have something you'd like to quack about yourself. Try it sometime when the need arises. You'll feel better.
Quack!
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