Travel seems to make people forget their grief. I remember, in teaching eighth grade, we read a story about a woman, recently widowed, who took the insurance money her husband left her and went on a round-the-world trip. Stranded in Afghanistan (before the war), she and her two children were made captives by a tribal chief who meant to make her his concubine. Her equally stranded cab driver translated her cry, “Oh, bad luck seems to follow me wherever I go.” The tribal chief took off with her luggage.
My own mother, after my invalid grandmother died, took off to join her husband here in the States, crossing occupied France and Spain to board the boat in 1942, in Lisbon, with her three sons. My nephew, Philip, has just completed a bike trip across America following the death of his father, who was remembered for his cross-country motorcycle ride after his divorce.
In our sub-conscious we know how to heal. It evolved with us under the comforting hand of the Father in heaven.
