The night before

Tomorrow my alarm will wake me up at stupid o'clock so I can get to the airport in time to catch my flight to South Africa. I'm going to South Africa! For the World Cup! The entire thing! With guaranteed tickets to the final! Which England might even get to!

I am absolutely shitting myself.

I've sensed the bemusement on peoples' faces when revealing this information in the last few days. Wait a minute, they will have been thinking, you're taking a month off work to go halfway across the world so you can witness one of the great sporting events in person, and you're not bouncing off the walls with excitement??

I see their point. Unfortunately, as someone who craves the orderliness of a safe, familiar routine, I do not make for an ideal traveller. I am also a terrible worrier. I blame this entirely on my mother, who could find the grey cloud of doom attached to every silver lining. Whatever I did with my life, there would always be something for her to nag me about, no matter that the something was likely to be entirely outside of my and her control, and therefore only worth worrying about if it happened. Which it never did. Of course people generally do this because they care, which she did, very much. Knowing that never made the nagging any less annoying, however. And this constant gnaw of worry appears to have been passed down to me fully intact. God help my future children.

Of course there are many, many things to look forward to over the next month, and I will hopefully be able to make regular posts full of positivity and excitement which will prove highly irritating for readers stuck in the UK. Oddly the things that concern me most aren't the possibility of getting mugged/carjacked/AIDS or whatever. It's the mundanities that make me really nervous - will I be able to wash/dry my clothes properly and regularly enough? As an inxperienced driver, will I keep stalling the car and making a fool of myself? Will I get bored without my regular comfort blanket of fast broadband/Sky Sports on tap? Such is the lot of the worrier.

Still, I'm sure everything will be fine! Next stop, the other side of the world!

*whistles tunelessly and unconvincingly*

Comments

melbourne dreaming said…
You and me both, Ben! Damn that incessant worrying gene. As with most of these things, you'll probably stop worrying when you're in the midst of your adventure and it'll be great. Have a brilliant time :)
11:40 am
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