Margaret Montet - Nerd Traveler

Nerd Travler

When I hit age fifty, I thought: is this all there is? It sounds depressing, but I wasnt depressed. I have a fulfilling librarian job which enables me to be independent and creative, and allows me to champion books and reading. They pay me to be a book nerd. I have good friends and family. I dont have the children and grandchildren that other women my age and older dote on, but I could never imagine myself a mom to little humans. I suspect that little humans Ive known cant imagine me as a mom either, but grown men say I remind them of their moms. I get that ALL the time.

I wondered: is the style and situation of life that I have now what Ill have from now on? Is this all there is? Is it enough or do I want more, and what would that be? As I focused on writing about places, I found myself learning about people in history. I found that Johann Strauss (the Waltz King) is so much more than a hack who wrote catchy waltz ditties. I did my best to see Prague with its maze-like streets through Kafkas eyes. I recognized a kindred spirit in Henry David Thoreau who wrote at Walden Pond that he wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life. I want to suck the marrow out of life, too, but quietly and metaphorically.

I was yearning to write deeper, more literary essays like the kind my literary heroes write (think Paul Theroux, Susan Orlean, Annie Dillard, and John McPhee.) I found a Master of Fine Arts writing program that required attendance at a two-week European residency every summer for three years. (Go big or go home, right?) I hungered for travel and to write about the locations I see through an age appropriate lens, creating the lyricism of transcendent travel narratives.

I take a lot of notes in small notebooks I can conceal in my handbag. By hiding my little notebooks, I believe Im concealing my writing nerd tendencies, but I am discovered as soon as I pull out the notebook to record something marvelous. I get some strange looks from people, but I do it anyway. I imagine myself an anthropologist taking important field notes or a detective like Olivia Benson or Harriet the Spy. (Wait, does Benson ever write stuff down?) I also betray my nerd status when I choose a quiet evening of journaling over dazzling (as I imagine it) nightlife. These hand-written journals are the basis of my essays because in them I have recorded my impressions while they are still fresh. I have a talent for encountering misadventures and being seated near colorful characters in restaurants. The memories that are resplendent enough to remain with me upon my re-entry into ordinary life color my stories with my unique perspective. Thats my method, usually.

Please keep this next revelation under your hat. It may border on the ridiculous. I actually write a short research proposal for myself before I embark upon a journey. I might abandon or refine this proposal once I set out to write about the travel experience and how it has changed me, but it helps me focus my attention. (I wouldnt enter a fabric store without a list to stick to or else Ill walk out in debt and with enough 100% cotton fabric for 67 quilts.) My little research proposal helped me in Vienna, for example, where I had limited time and many landmarks from music history to explore. I visited Mozarts house, Johann Strausss house, the composer statues in the Stadtpark, and the Vienna Opera, but Beethovens and Schuberts houses would have to wait until next time. My research proposal focused me on how Vienna presents its musical heritage. Besides my research proposal, I spend a lot of time preparing for a trip selecting books to read. I need one to read on the plane and an extra for the trip back just in case. Nonfiction with information and history about my destination is great, but I need also light fiction for when there are distractions. I think by now readers will have perceived that my travel curiosity transcend the average and shoots off on a nerd trajectory.

My perceptions of a place, or appreciation of music, art, or literature, are influenced by conversations I have enjoyed with close friends. Stop by my office and tell me what you heard on National Public Radio which reminded you of me. Suggest a walk in nature and well talk about a film youve just seen. Accompany me on a day trip to somewhere close which, for some reason, we have not yet visited. Commit to a stress-free weekend jaunt to visit historic homes weve always wanted to see. Im grateful to have these curious, intelligent people in my life to stretch my mind. Emerson said: Strict conversation with a friend is the magazine out of which all good writing is drawn. Likewise, I treasure visits with friends and family in my original hometown of Cape May, not simply for the companionship, but because they, without fail, show me new ways to appreciate this familiar place so close to my heart.

I noticed this: Mom and Dad kept showing up in my writing. They are where Im from. Im from Cape May, too, and Hamilton, New Jersey, and Philadelphia. Im from family, friends, teachers and chance encounters. My parents have both been gone for years, but the fact that they and their values still influence my existence reminds me how much I miss them. A trip to the beach makes me think of Dad trying to teach me about shore birds. A movie-locations tour in Manhattan reminds me of my attempts to break through my Brooklynite moms dementia with movies she might recognize. They were both old enough to be my grandparents, actually, and their wisdom and experience (though I didnt always appreciate this when I was a teenager) made me into the quiet, temperate, cautious adult (okay, nerd) Ive always been. Dad was a fatherless eight-year old Cajun lad in Louisiana when his widowed mother packed him and his six siblings up for a Great Migration north to Chicago. The opportunities they found were limited, and soon theyd battle the Great Depression. During World War II he met my mother on an iceskating rink in Brooklyn, and they married in 1943. In 1950, they bought this house in Cape May where I sit right now. Thirteen years after that, I appeared on the scene and changed everything, especially their visions of quiet retirement at the seashore. They were settled, experienced, wise, and somewhat out-of-date, and thats where I came from.