The thing that makes me happiest about not going anywhere as a child, not experiencing much as a child besides books and more books and the occasional romp in the woods is that I still frequently experience that feeling of ohmygodIcan'tbelieveI'mhere. I even still occasionally have the experience of ohmygodIcan'tbelieveIevenhavefriends.

I want to pass this on.

I'd rather have my adult life filled with wonder than have had all this stuff as a kid and get jaded early, young. I know people who went all over the place as children, and they're jaded now. They see travelling as just something you do, a vague desire to fulfill, something to be used to. Something to spend their spring breaks on, their vacation time on. Not a crazy amazing privilege.

Which it is.

I'd rather not have to go to big "exotic" places (although I am in a really "exotic" place right now) to get that high. I'd rather still see the City (which I love, which I adore, cities I do) as a huge enormous thing that astounds me every day.

The nice thing about us displaced Midwestern and Southern kids is we retain that longer, I think. Even those who have left the heartland for good. Yes, I generalize, but I don't know any other way to explain my feeling of kinship. We gingerly take bites of the Big City experience as if any second it could get snatched away, and we savor each mouthful.

Eventually, I think some of the wonder disappears, as we grow old, as we get many many of those new experiences we lacked but desired as children. Maybe for some of us, it all does. I'm glad it hasn't for me, though.