More than that

Photo: Thatched bamboo house with rice straw roof in a Khmu village, Luang Prabang province, Laos.

I associate the song "Guess How Much I Love You" by the Lucksmiths with being twenty and being in love, and finding any separation at all an ominous, painful gulf. But when I was compiling my travel playlist it felt rather appropriate too.

I bought a postcard
I'm getting close but
I haven't got around to it yet
I know I said I'd write
And maybe I might

It's harႈd to pull together all the threads while travelling, hard to live in the moment and also get to all those things that need doing. Sometimes I feel like all I can think about are obstacles; and things to feel anxious about; and the moments spent waiting for something to happen, as if all the day is nothing but in-between time.

On the map the gap's three fingers
But it's more than that
More than that

Distances can seem so incalculably large when you look at two points, if all you think of is the gulf between them. But travelling this way, roaming over the surface of the earth and finding the familiar in so many previous unknowns, I find myself thinking of it the other way around. It's not gaps any more, but just so much more space to be filled, so much more possibility.

Lyrics.