On Habit & Traveling Alone

Welcome to Hopkinton (hometown)
By the time I read Alain de Batton’s piece “On Habit” I had already read many of the other Art of Travel students’ blog responses for this assignment. Everyone’s reaction to this chapter seemed very similar; most people easily relate to Batton’s writing about growing too accustomed to a place, whether in their hometown or New York City or wherever they are studying. Likewise, Batton’s stories reminded me of my own habitual lifestyles and I can only agree with what everyone else has written about the piece. But even though this reading succeeded to increase my awareness of my own unfavorable habitual behaviors, I am not inspired enough to return to my hometown with a new attitude. I don’t anticipate myself attempting to find a new beauty in the minute details of suburbia because I think that habit is too natural and too unavoidable. I have tried before to experience my hometown in a new light…to appreciate how it is unique and to actually see the everyday things that I have grown blind to over the years of my childhood. But this only lasts for so long; my efforts always fade with time and once again I become too accustomed. Naturally, time away from my hometown is the only thing that allows me to notice and to appreciate some of the everyday details that I was once too habituated with. Still, after time passes I become once again blind by my familiarization.

I actually found myself intrigued by a different idea that Batton mentioned about travel in “On Habit”: the theory that it is advantageous to travel alone because “our responses to the world are crucially moulded by the company we keep, for we temper our curiosity to fit in with the expectations of others”. Batton’s ideas resonated with me because it is true that when I travel alone, I feel like I am able to experience place in a unique way, but I had never considered how or why the company of others may be responsible for the shape of my experiences. Remembering times when I have traveled with friends and family, it is difficult for me to label exactly how people are able to influence me. Batton contends that others may have a particular vision of who we are and hence may subtly prevent certain sides of us from emerging. Many of the people I have traveled with are people that I feel so comfortable with, that I don’t think they could have prevented a particular side of me from emerging. Still, there is no relationship like the one I have with myself. No matter how comfortable I am with whom I travel, there is something very different about traveling alone. Maybe it has less to do with the influence of the others you travel with and more to do with the unique experience of being entirely alone. Usually, experiences are moments to be shared. Maybe it is when there is no one else to share your experiences, the things that you see and you feel, that you grow closest to yourself and to your surroundings.