The Sickness of Land

Seasickness is a well-known ailment that imposes long hours of torture on fragile hearts adrift in the waves. However, much less is said about its little brother, land sickness.

Only those who are of the sea experience this torment. Stepping onto solid ground after long weeks at sea, they exchange their agility for a swaying gait. Like penguins, they are as skilled at sea as they are clumsy on land. Disturbed by the absence of movement, the minds of these men lose their bearings and long for just one thing: to find the gentle rocking of the ship again.

As far back as I can remember, I have always had land sickness.

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Not tolerating any stop, this sickness pushes me ever further and makes me purr when I see the landscapes rolling by from the window of a bus, my dreamy gaze lost in the distance.

It provides the essential energy to my legs to tackle the mountains that rise before me; to my arms to row to the cave that shapes up in the distance; to my back to carry the few belongings that follow me in my wanderings. It gives me the necessary impetus to always desire more. To imagine. To discover.

And after this turn, what will the landscape look like?

As a child, I waited all year for summer and the Day of Departure. I impatiently hoped to climb into the family car to start our Grand Vacations. The prospect of long journeys always thrilled me. In fact, vacations are among my few childhood memories. It was as if, from my birth to the age of 10, I had only lived three weeks a year.

The hours of enforced immobility, squeezed between my siblings, the luggage, and the dogs, did not scare me. In fact, I hoped for them. I loved those moments of intense camaraderie, that electric atmosphere where we dreamed of the beautiful days to come. Destination Anywhere. Under the sun. A need to compensate for the annual surplus of dullness.

Sitting for hours on the back seat, I did not feel frozen. On the contrary. I was in motion. But was it me or the landscape that was moving? In the end, it didn't matter. I was movement.

Hypnotized by this incessant spectacle, I watched my window's view change shape, language, and color. Happy. My head bobbing from side to side, I dozed off under the purring of the engine. And yet, my mind raced in all directions. I have never been as alert as in movement. Freed from its sedentary state, it soars into reveries and thoughts that I could not have reached under normal circumstances. It becomes a Nomad. Creative. Free.

Is it you, Dad, who passed this land sickness down to me by talking about your childhood in Africa? Or you, Mom, who even as early as September was already preparing our trip for the following summer? Is land sickness genetic? Or contagious? Innate or acquired, I couldn't say which prevails in this tug-of-war. Probably both. The sickness is made.

But land sickness is a terrible ailment. An incomprehensible suffering. Immobility is painful. The mind becomes stagnant, the legs weaken. But the feet tingle. They do not forget. Neither the road nor the movement.

To leave. A word that comes to the tip of the tongue, attempting to pass the lips.

To move. A desire that blossoms step by step.

A vicious cycle, movement calling for movement. A nomadic desire, land sickness is an invitation to the road more than a need for elsewhere.

For it is not an escape. No.

Or yes. An escape from sedentary life. An escape to Somewhere. To the Other. To Oneself.

No need to travel to distant lands or go around the world. Even if these romantic ideas are enticing to land sickness, what it seeks above all is action. To depart. Even right outside your home. Every great trip begins with a first step. And it is this step, precisely that one, that land sickness craves. But do not think that it will be fooled by vague promises. No, not a chance. A real first step is preceded by countless others. It is a blind promise we make: to continue. Step by step. Again.

Land sickness has taken me to cold territories, from Canada and Patagonia, to other humid ones, from Northern Ireland and the Amazon, or dry and arid ones, from the desert of Wadi Rum and that of Atacama. It has urged me to plunge into the tropical waters of the Galapagos, to walk among the faces of the Moai, to fly in a helicopter over the ruins of Angkor, to build a raft to float down a tropical river, to paragliding off the cliffs of Peru, to immerse myself in dark Mexican caves, to navigate in the Chilean fjords and between the Finnish islands...

White, yellow, blue, green. It has shown me all the colors.

But over time, this sickness is one to which you become attached. It becomes an intimate friend, a travel companion. When we settle down, between two steps, we promise it we will hit the road again. We set a date. And it waits for us. It knows, that it can be difficult sometimes. To leave, to give up, to depart, to abandon. People, landscapes, places, promises. So it waits. And if we happen to forget it, it reminds us. Slowly at first. More insistently later. It is time to go.

It has taught me, more than to desire my final destination, to appreciate the movement. To desire it for itself, without any other goal. The quest for the quest.

The results? The solutions? The answers? I leave those to you!

I prefer to search. To investigate endlessly. To discover infinitely.

Move. Advance. Walk. Roll. Navigate. Pedal. Ride. Fly...

For, as far back as I can remember, I have always had land sickness.