The Traveler's Scrap

Glorious southwest scenery rolled by the train's big picture windows. She was staring down at a big book balanced across her lap.  This young woman took up one seat… her large, fat scrapbook  spilled onto the next.  

Crossing America on Amtrack's Sunset Limited, we were fellow travelers seated in the upper deck of the train's observation car. "Whatcha doing?" I asked. She was furiously gluing travel pamphlets, luggage tags and swizzle sticks into an overflowing scrapbook.  She replied with an Aussie twang, "Oh.. I just keep all my travel stuff in here. Stuff I collect along the way. My boyfriend thinks I'm nuts."

Her book was large, heavy and already hard to close. Still it had a grand, crinkled look that showed a lot of miles and messing with. " I really don't take the time to write in a journal….and I don't really like taking pictures…. so I do this instead. I collect stuff. Then I put it in this book."

"Looks like a long trip", I mused.  "Right, she replied. We are going across America to California… then some time in the Pacific. Then home."  She was one of those young Australians that make it their mission to visit Europe and world in one grand journey, traveling for a year or so. She was out for as long as her see-the-world-budget held out,  visiting as many destinations as possible.  

"When this book gets full I'll send it home, so when I get back I can remember where I've been. My mum likes getting these books in the mail. I'm excited about showing it to my family." 

I wish I had photgraphed Aussie gal's journal. This is one of my trip journals, inspired by her.  

We chatted a while longer as she glued.  Her book was a colorful chaos of maps, postcards, flyers with overlapping edges, scrawly labels. tape,  tears, smudges.  She seemed unconcerned she could barely close the cover and the book looked like it weighed about ten pounds.

I fell in love with the fact that her book had too many memories to fit neatly on prescribed pages. That conversation changed the way I thought about my journals. I gave up my prim, hard back sketchbook for something different. Over time my travel journals morphed into a format that collected what I found along the way. 

Then and there I decided that's the kind of journal (and life) I want…. one too full to fit between conventional covers. Let the experiments begin... Now I'm inclined to let the stuff of my travels shape my journals, rather than forcing my memories to fit into a neat little book. So often my travel journals are asked to accommodate the odd, the out sized and unexpected things. 

But, isn't that why we travel?