'My home town is a whole different scenery, the old timers on the stoop leaning leisurely, the new jacks up in the bar smoking greenery'

Reality. 'The world or the state of things as they actually exist, as opposed to an idealistic or notional idea of them, eg:  "he refuses to face reality".' Intense, right? I, myself, much prefer the ever-omnipresent Urban Dictionary's #1 rated effort;

'A delusionary mental status caused by a pronounced deficiency of alcohol in the bloodstream' Or, if you want to really go for a full-throttle, philosophical, life-reassessing definition, try entry 11; 'Reality has become a commodity. When money dictates the content of Wikipedia entries, reality may be defined by the highest bidder.' It's a bit much, but I like the real depth of feeling with that one. I've heard the word a significant amount over the last week and a half. To give you some context, I've been away from the UK for nearly three years, pulled off a nifty little surprise and bounced right back into this so-called little reality last week. Australia for a year, New Zealand for nearing on two, Thailand for just five weeks. I've not been trekking through jungles for months on end, I've not been living up a nondescript mountain trying to find myself down the path of true enlightenment and I have certainly not been hopping from place to place the entire time. Hell, I haven't even lived in a non-English speaking country. What I've been doing isn't that different from life in the UK at all. It may involve a lot more jagerbombs than the normal human being would deem healthy, but aside from that, people do exactly what I did in my time away in thousands of places all across the globe. So what then, I hear you ask, is so fucking big and clever about travelling? Why have I come home feeling weird and antsy, and not quite ready for all of this 'reality' shit everybody keeps banging on about? In short, what makes coming home so hard? Let's start with the obvious: Why does one go travelling in the first place? There's not really a cookie-cutter answer for this question. Reasons vary from person to person depending on circumstance and whatnot. I was only intending on going to Australia for a month when I first left, egged on by my brother, who had done a three and a half year stint in times gone by, to extend it to a year. A year became two, became three. My motivations were pretty much that I had just finished uni, didn't fancy the bright lights of London, the green fields and endless roundabouts of Hampshire or the 22,000 students of Cardiff when I was not one, and was real adverse to the idea of going full whack straight into a job that could define the next ten years of my life. I'd like to stress that this was because I had no idea what I wanted to do for the summer of 2009, let alone the ten summers after that. The people who know what they want to do with their lives should never forget that they really are extraordinarily lucky. Most importantly, I thought it would be a great way to extend the glory days of university; meeting new people, drinking myself blind and having next to no responsibility. My 20-year-old self liked to party, what can I say. My 23-year-old self still thinks she's 20. OK, I get that. But where exactly is the value in it? This is something that bothers me a great deal and I have an image of myself in 20 years being asked this question and gritting my teeth, rolling my eyes and counting to ten. It's like asking for the value in forging a career, getting a mortgage, settling down with your partner; things that society place great emphasis on in order to make you happy. If travelling makes you happy, isn't there an unbelievable value in it? And is it not slightly ignorant to even ask the question if that is the case? And if you really want to go further than that completely fucking obvious point, then let's go all out. I cannot stress enough how valuable I believe travelling can be for people. It builds your self-confidence in a unparalleled way, pushes you into new situations, makes you a great deal more open-minded and at times, forces you to really look in the mirror and come to terms with the things that perhaps ain't so pretty. I know that this is probably one of the most cliched terms that people use when discussing the merits of travel, but it's fucking true and that's why people say it: you learn a great deal about yourself. I will not apologise for saying that, as cheesy as it is, because I believe it whole-heartedly. So there. But don't you miss home?? Sure. It'd probably be weirder if you didn't. The biggest thing I faced when I was away was loneliness. You make friends and have some relationships that will continue for years, but there are sometimes periods where things aren't so rosy and that's where the real test is. You may wonder what you're doing, where you're going next, you may get bored, unstimulated, confused. Home is maybe the first thing on your mind in those situations. But such is life; you go through ups and downs while travelling just like anybody else. It's not a perfect existence where you avoid the realities of being a human being; there are amazing times and there are shitty times. Some days you think of home, some days you don't. A lot of people make a decision, sooner or later, to go back to wherever home may be. Some people regret it, some don't. Whatever the case, home will always be a huge part of your life. So, you're home. Back to reality. What are you gonna do now? Jeepers. This is the question that terrified me on coming home. I threw myself headfirst into the wolfpack on my return; without really thinking through the inevitable 'HOLY SHIT!' thought processes that I was sure to experience, I decided to surprise my whole family at my Mum's 60th birthday party. 80+ people, some of whom I'd not seen for over ten years and all of them dying to ask the same question: 'So Francesca, what will you do now?'. After a barrage of these in a multitude of forms, I nearly decked the last person who asked me, which would've been a shame as I've known him as long as I can remember and he really does have a lovely vegetable garden. I made to sure to ask him about that before I made my excuses and ran away screaming into the night wondering what on earth I had done. I am slightly exaggerating, of course. But it's a difficult question to process within the first 24 hours of landing on home soil, particularly if you've not paid the concept much attention beforehand. Nearly two weeks later, it hasn't gotten much better. Most people I encountered, mostly those in my parents generation, thought after three years I would have 'gotten it out of my system' and would finally be ready to 'settle down' and get a 'real job'. I don't know. What the fuck is a 'real' job anyway? My experience of 'proper' jobs comes in the form of my friends, who after graduating have moved to the city, edged their way up the career ladder by working their asses off and in the process are doing pretty darn well for themselves. I am nothing but proud of them for that. The one thing I wish I could articulately explain is why I don't feel the need to do this yet. I totally get why they have made those decisions and I applaud them for it. Truth is, I am just not ready. I don't think it's wrong, I don't think it's invaluable and I don't think it's a waste. Far from it. I just know it's not the path for me yet. I have met a lot of people who have done the 9-5 thing, the career, the money and the professional and personal status. Some of them thrive on it. Some are miserable. Everybody is different and I just wish I could get across that all it is is a difference of perspective. Life can be as fulfilling travelling as it is when you have a made another move upwards in your career, or a step forwards in your personal life. The happiness that derives from travel has a simplicity that life in a career-driven place like the UK does not. As a good friend of mine said to me just yesterday; 'Traveling let's you appreciate the moment, not the impending stress of the future... I think it's more open minded, and for me, more relaxed and fair... You appreciate the smaller stuff. Happiness isn't measured in success or social standing. If you are happy you are happy.' If this means you work 50 hours a week serving wet pussies and slippery nipples to shitfaced travelers in a backpacker bar, so be it. If it means you slave away in the sweltering sun picking various seasonal fruits on a farm in the middle of fucking nowhere, then you do what you gotta do. If it means handing out tedious flyers for ridiculous promotions on a dark winters night, at least you can console yourself that it is for a purpose. It is, for the most part, a means to an end; you do it so you can experience the world in the process and you should never look down on somebody for doing something that, in turn, will make them happy. At the end of the day, that is what this very long-winded, nonsensical verbal diarrhea that I've just spouted is about - being happy. I think one of the main things I've taken out of my time away is to just try and make sure that that's what I am. However it is achieved, life really is too short for otherwise. The majority of Western culture, in my humble opinion, is over-populated with materialistic values, the craving for status and the inane need to make other people believe that you are succeeding in life. I find all of this a bit suffocating, and one of my favourite things about travelling is that it is an opportunity to give you an alternative. That said, I'm only 23 and I still have a hell of a lot to learn. I just hope I can do it with a little bit of pazazz, and a great big goofy grin on my face. 'For my part, I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel's sake. The great affair is to move; to feel the needs and hitches of our life more nearly; to come down off this feather-bed of civilization, and find the globe granite underfoot and strewn with cutting flints.' - Robert Louis Stevenson