"I Want A Life"

I want a life measured

in first steps on foreign soils

and deep breaths

in brand new seas.

I want a life measured

in Welcome signs,

each stamped

with a different name,

borders marked with metal and paint.

Show me the streets

that don't know the music

of my meandering feet

and I will play their song

upon them.

Perfume me please

in the smells of far away,

I will never wash my hair

if it promises to stay.

I want a life measured

in the places I haven't gone,

short sleeps on long flights,

strange voices teaching me

new words to describe

the dawn.

-Tyler Knott Gregson

Travelling has always been a huge part of my life. I have traveled to more places than I can count on my hands. I have seen new horizons and fallen in love with foreign languages. I have stood in streets flooded with people that I don't understand and yet I found peace in that. I am a person with tolerance for the unknown. I do not look at the unknown with fear but rather with excitement because I am about to go into a world I have never been to before.

I will know why the little girl laughed so hard during that commercial or why people go home at a certain time a day. I will learn it all and then some. The poem also has an amazing way of explaining every single aspect of traveling by not only explaining the traveling in itself and the imagery of the place as it usually happens, instead there were descriptions of universal aspects of traveling like welcome mats and strange voices.

I have always dreamt of a life where I got paid doing something I love while traveling. This is a big part of why I am studying to become a professional translator and interpreter. This job will send me around the world where I will get to learn new languages. Also, I have always had a huge passion for learning new languages and I resonate with the language that is used to describe language and learning a new language. I think language is one of the most beautiful things to exist because every one of them is different yet similar.

There are words in one language that don't have the same meaning when translated. Not unless you speak the language will you understand the context of the words that are flowing into speech right before your eyes. There are sayings and proverbs that other languages will never be able to fully grasp and if I told you right now to reach for the stars, you would understand. You would visualize your dreams but somewhere around the world this was translated and a literal meaning was grasped from it. You see, because language is not a simple thing. It is a complex thing in which people's lives are built around and I will venture into the great unknown knowing I will never understand it all and being at peace with myself for it because I was at least able to get a glimpse.