Working at a Tourism bureau, you speak with loads of interesting and crazy people. Some of them want to know about the dating scene, night clubs, shopping, safety....vegetables indigenous to Wisconsin (don't ask) and then some of them leave an impression on me.
A woman called in saying she had just returned from a trip around the world, 2 years of traveling. She started in South America, made her way to Africa, stayed in Europe (mainly Italy) and lived in India for 6 months before heading to Australia, New Zealand and the Cook Islands. Listening to her made me excited and a bit envious. Then she dropped the bomb....she was dying of Multiple Sclerosis. Originally from Madison,she made it her goal to see the world and write about every country she visited. As her reflexes changed, nervous system lost functions, vision disappeared and her speech began to slur, she said she left a piece of herself in every country she visited. She saw it as a way of ridding herself of the illness. Each place she went was like casting off a piece she no longer needed and finding a new part, completely free of disease.
Just recently she had gone back to her home in Ohio, she hated it, but had faith she would return to Madison. She was requesting a visitor guide because she said she liked to flip through it and remember all the places she had been as a child. She told me it was the last stop on her trip, the place she wanted to die. She did everything she wanted, saw the places she dreamed of going and wanted to come full circle, back home.
Color me inspired. I'm gonna see the world.
