The Anticipation of Adventure

Nobody sets out to lose their sense of wonder. We misplace it a little at a time, somewhere between the first paycheck and the hundredth status meeting. In its place we install a life of routine: predictable, controllable, and about as thrilling as a well-organized sock drawer. Then, we stand in front of that drawer and wonder why we're unhappy. The cure isn't complicated. We need some zest. We need to be shaken up, stretched, and occasionally proven wrong. Few things do that better than leaving home on purpose. And here's what most people miss: the adventure starts long before the airport. A trip on the calendar is a light at the end of a tunnel you didn't know you were in. The dreary Tuesdays, the weeks when work and life conspire to arrive all at once, get easier to bear when there's a date circled in big red sharpie sit out yonder. It's a pressure valve you install in advance. Hope, with a boarding time. Then there's the planning, which is the closest most of us come to designing…