Royal Concessions

YAY, in a few minutes it'll be September and I can say I leave this month! Isn’t it about time!?

Seems like I’ve barely made a ripple in the pond of summer for the last couple of years. Last year I was in the throes of job-searching (ugh) and this year I’ve been prepping for the Big Trip. Summer sort of slid by unnoticed.

The payoff – two months in Europe – should be totally worth it. For the first time ever, I'm a fan of autumn. My brain is sooo ready for some novelty, even if it’s looking out on somebody else’s backyard.

Every day I’ve tried to do at least one significant thing to move myself closer to “there.” Today’s agenda involved a phone call to the Queen’s Gallery in Buckingham Palace. That's in London, y'know. My online trolling had unearthed what sounds like a very posh and nifty art lecture and reception taking place Oct. 21 as part of their current exhibit, “Art & Love: The Passion of Victoria and Albert.” The curators of this fascinating royal couple’s art collection, assembled over their 22 years of marriage, will give an erudite talk and then the ticketed guests can wander through the galleries and mingle with one another to the strains of live music.

The event notice also mentioned refreshments. Very civilized, I thought. And tickets seemed reasonable – “12 pounds (8 pounds concessions),” according to the website.

Tickets weren’t available online, thus necessitating the phone call. With Visa at the ready, I ordered two tickets with concessions, figuring if I’m going all the way to Buckingham Palace for a do, I’m gonna get my royal hot dog and Co-cola, right? The lady on the phone hesitated. “No, madam,” she explained patiently. “It’s either 12 pounds OR 8 pounds.”

Not fully grasping that we were in the midst of one of those quirky American English breakdowns, I said again (more slowly this time) that I would like tickets to the lecture AND refreshments, figuring that the 12 pounds was the base price and eats were an additional 8.

“Ah,” as light dawned in the bowels of the palace. “Concessions means ‘Are you in a special demographic categ’ry, like child or senior citizen?’ If you fit into one of those groups, the price is only 8 pounds – and yes, it includes both the lecture and refreshments.”

Well, did I feel like an idiot?! Who knew? I’m a concessionaire! We finally got it sorted, I got my “concession” because I’m at this advanced pinnacle of age – and yes, I’m getting my hot dog and Co-cola as well as the scholarly lecture, for a budget-wise 8 pounds (about 12 bucks). Life is good.

OK, I doubt whether a weenie has ever actually emanated from Her Majesty’s kitchen, but you get my drift. The ticket lady did mention something about wine and hors d’oeuvres. Wonder whether they’ll break out the Waterford crystal for me?

Packing my 'chute

"For my part, I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel's sake. The great affair is to move." -- Robert Louis Stevenson

I can't totally agree with ol' Bob there -- the idea of traveling to Afghanistan, Pakistan or any of the 'stans, for that matter, holds no appeal at all, I'm afraid. But I get the gist of what he's driving at: The going is important. Yep, I do get that.

My exchangers from France arrive a month from today. For all intents and purposes my own trip begins then. You can't see it, but I'm doing a Happy Dance.

As most of you know, I've arranged back-to-back house swaps in France and England this fall. Already I'm getting those little butterflies in the bottom of my stomach when I've got a trip coming up. It's a familiar, pleasant, slightly unsettling feeling. Will I remember to pack my underpants?

Having inherited the McCarn anal streak, I make To Do lists. These To Do lists have spawned more To Do lists. We're now at To Do 6.0.

And then there's the house: It has lists of its own. When you swap your house with someone else, of course you want to leave it in spruce condition. But in the months leading up to the exchange, at least at my address, water marks myteriously appear in the ceiling, my mattress starts sagging, and all the rugs and curtains, like lepers, start screaming "Unclean! Unclean!" My fellow exchangers usually report this same phenomenon.

I'm ticking off tasks daily, but with only a month to go, I'm not sure I'll be fully ready to leave by November. Of 2012.

Having said all that, as usual I'm actually savoring the preparations, the research, the anticipation. I call it packing my 'chute. It's the earliest part of the travel package, and it always pumps me up for the adventure ahead.

Of course, not every trip involves new custom-made draperies in the living room, thank goodness. But I looked at the pending arrival of my visitors as a handy excuse to take on that long-overdue home decor project. They're already up and look exceptionally cool. (See for yourself above.)

The first couple with whom I'm exchanging, Yves and Chantal Benoistel, live right outside Paris. After they arrive in Charlotte we'll have 24 hours together before I leave Sept. 10. It'll be wonderful to meet them, get them oriented to my newly-spiffed-up house and show them a bit how the streets work around town (i.e., Queens, Queens, Queens and Queens Roads).

I just hope they like big, bold, burgundy-colored tulips.

On the joy of "reading"

It may have been St. Francis of Assisi -- or Groucho Marx or Madonna, I forget which -- who said that the world is a book, and they who don't travel are reading only one page.

As a kid the farthest I ever got was central Florida. This was in the pre-Disney days, you understand, so there was basically nothing there but bugs and swamps. I was relegated to the back of a pickup truck that had been crudely tricked out as a camper. A boiling hot, dismal camper. The Okies escaping the Dust Bowl had more luxury. The memory is not a pleasant one. Of course, my mother featured in this episode, so that's enough explanation right there.

Neither Mama nor Daddy cared one whit about going anywhere, not even the beach. Daddy had had his four-year hitch in the Army in Europe during WWII, and that did it for him. He got back in one piece, and he aimed to stay put from then on.

The travel bug first bit me in college. Visiting classmates in exotic locales like Reading, PA, and Hackensack, NJ, was like being set down on a distant planet, and this small-town North Carolina gal loved every rundown row house, every turnpike snarl, every exotic sausage.

It was different than Lexington, you see. And different was interesting.

Picture a dog with its head stuck out of the window of a car, its mouth open and its tongue flapping in pure joy over being taken for a ride. That's me at the start of a trip.

I'm hardly a backpack-and-tent rambler -- I require a clean bed and indoor plumbing at the end of the day -- but travel eventually took on a spiritual quality. On the road, it's easier to find magic in the ordinary. Life is more vivid. You rediscover things you'd forgotten you missed.

Don't get me wrong. My "homepage" is a comfortable, familiar place to browse. The view from my sunroom is beautiful. But to take my breath away, give me a new vista anytime.

(I took the picture above in September 2008 on the Greek island of Santorini. It still takes my breath away...!)