So. Here we are, six weeks out from our round-the-world departure, and I’m starting to feel more than a little overwhelmed about the list of things to do. We’ve both traveled pretty extensively but it seems to me that traveling in my twenties was substantially easier than this time round. Is it because I have a house? A partner? Plants and a freezer and chickens and bees and a garden? Yes, yes, and yes to all that. Plus a business that requires a great deal of my focus and energy, even while I prepare to let it go dormant for a time. And I’m older, and wearier, for certain. And yet…every time I find myself in a state of absolute panic, I start thinking about that open road ahead of us in January. I think about getting on the plane in Denver – carrying, of course, a copy of the Sunday New York Times because I’m only allowed that special luxurious pleasure when I travel – and I think about all of the adventures we’re about to have that I don’t even know about yet. And that makes my list of immunizations, shopping, visas, storage, bank accounts, arranging and rearranging worth it. It will absolutely be worth it.