Waiting

Adventure is waiting. It's patient too. Every morning when I leave the house I see it sitting there in the garage. Adventure is right there. It's waiting. In math when something IS another thing they are equal. So when we say 5 is 3+2 then 3+2 is 5. They are equal. However, adventure is waiting but waiting isn't adventure. 
Waiting is sometimes one of the hardest things to do. Like when you arrive on time but the bus or train is late. Or when you are in a hurry to be on time to catch the movie but your friend is slow getting ready. Or worse yet, you are waiting to hear that a friend who just had heart surgery made it through without complications. Or a friend goes into labor and you wait anxiously to hear the news that a healthy baby has been delivered and both mom and the baby are doing well. Or you wait in traffic because there is no other way and the highway is bumper to bumper, guardrail to guardrail and the ambulance and the tow truck are behind you. Waiting sucks. Waiting in the waiting room at the doctor's office for the doctor to call you in only to be seated in a small exam room only to wait some more. At least the waiting room has magazines and sometimes there's a TV or other people to watch. The exam room only has a few medical posters and pamphlets about Lymes disease or depression for you to read. 
Waiting is sometimes agonizing. It's frustrating. Waiting for your grades to be posted. Waiting for your alarm to go off in the morning even though you've been up tossing and turning for hours last night. Yet there in the garage adventure waits patiently. It smiles and sings terrible 80s songs to you softly each day, "I'll be right here waiting for you." "And I wait, without you, with or without you." 
Waiting for adventure can fill us with anticipation. Sometimes we get anxious about the unlikely, the improbable. Yet we waste our energy in such a way. What if we break down? What if the weather is bad along the way? What if when we get there, Wally World is closed for repairs? 
Other times we wait and focus our energy on the possibilities. The places we will go, the people we will see, the fun we will have and the exciting and unexpected twists and turns that await us when the time finally arrives for us to embark.
Will it be San Diego, or Calgary? The Tetons again or Lake Superior? When do we make it to Alaska? Mexico? Newfoundland? Will we get to try surfing again? Where will we go and what will we do? Phish is playing a festival in August? Can we swing it? 
Then we start planning out the upgrades and repairs. What's on the top of the list? Canvas and Sway Bar. Check. Next we save up and buy the front air conditioning unit... ordered and delivered. Then the parts sit and they wait too. 
As the days go by and the seconds tick passed you find yourself doing pretrip inspections and gathering your gear. You go through the list... sleeping bag, hammock, pillows, clothing, trekking poles, hiking shoes, toiletries etc. Then one day you realize that adventure isn't waiting... because Adventure IS HERE! In the words of the great Sam Rosen, "The waiting is over! The waiting is over!"