Going, going...

This is it. Tomorrow, at a little past noon Seattle time, I'm eastward bound, seeking adventure in England, Scotland and France until I return home on April 13.

Me, my wife and our traveling companions have been planning this European tour for more than a year. Finally, after months of French lessons, reading online brochures of hotels, scouting sites via our digital porthole, studying maps, and figuring the best route of movement, we're about to go. It's like the Normandy invasion, but with less luggage and preparation.

Seriously though, my wife and I are both taking one bag each, and tonight I finally wrestled my meager outfits and bathroom supplies into my One Bag of Power...only to have some little snap for the backpack straps suddenly vanish. A minor setback that nearly sent me over the edge. Please, please, please. Don't let this be some indicator of little nagging things that'll chase me all over this trip, distracting me from the big picture.

Of course, it's all in how you approach things. I have to keep a positive frame of mind. I'm going to be in close quarters with three other people, and I don't always travel well, often fidgeting to the point of structural collapse so I can wander off and get fresh air and have some solitude. For my 30th birthday, a friend passed on a quote by Edna St. Vincent Millay that she thought suited me: I love humanity, but I hate people.

But I'm going to London and Paris, Edinburgh and Wales, wondrous sites of old stories and vast culture. Breathe in, get on the plane. Breathe out, see the world. Breathe in, share space with friends and your wife. Breathe out, stare in amazement at Gothic cathedrals and flowing Seine. How can you bitch about your own space issues when you just entered a pub that's older than the United States itself? Complaining weighs down luggage in the end. Travel light when you go.

This is the world under your feet, and it's time you saw more of it than the comfortable glen of Seattle. Move beyond the superficial pain of crammed legs and jet lag. Get lost in the slow slope of an English meadow or the sensual curve of a Parisian street. Say hello to the gargoyles, who stand watch from their posts at Notre Dame. Hold your breath and count the seconds of pure silence at pagan ruins. Try to pick up on how much you don't really know about the world. Find the flow of the city, the rural plain. Hear the cadence of the people. See how fast they walk. Listen. Don't talk. Immerse yourself and move with the speed of the Thames or the Seine, and see where you end up.

This is merely the world, and you are about to enter a sliver of it. Remember your manners and go on and see sites that will make you appreciate the sometimes-subtle patchwork of culture, travel, humanity, the ghosts of history, and the aches and pains of when cities try to shift with turbulent populations. Should you go to the same spot you are going to today 20 years from now, it'll be different, so try to remember your travels with everything you got. This trip is yours.

Go.