Madison's Avenue Adventures

I suppose for most, seeing the prompt “How did I end up here?” sparked profound thinking as to how to tell a compelling story of life-changing worldly adventures. Strangely enough, I read the prompt and immediately thought about the Internet. No, I don’t mean to say that I ended up perusing Facebook with no sense as to how I came to be in front of my computer. What I mean is this: How does a young girl studying full time at a university find herself immersed in the culture of travel blogging, when she doesn’t even have the means to go out and actually travel?
It was on a warm Miami Tuesday, the day that I make my weekly shopping trip to Target to get food for my micro-sized dormitory refrigerator, when I found myself talking to a cashier about what our ambitions are in life. He revealed to me that he longed to open a themed restaurant in Wynwood, an artsy area in downtown Miami. He then asked me what I was studying at school, to which I responded, “International Studies.” In all honesty, this answer is not ordinarily received too well by others who often feel that I will not be able to find a job after graduation, so I was, or at least thought I was, prepared for any follow up question he could pose. I was not surprised by his response: “So what are you going to do with that?” but I was astounded by my lack of ability to answer. I looked down and shrugged, “I want to travel, but I guess so does everybody.” To say I was stunned by the response I received would be an understatement. My friend who was listening in on our conversation turned to me and rebutted blankly, “I don’t want to travel. I just want to stay in New York all my life.” The conversation ended there, we paid and left, but her response ruminated in my mind all night long.
How could anyone not want to travel, not want to learn what this world has to offer outside of the confines of our hometowns? This troubled me so much, and for so long, that a few weeks later I took out my computer and got to writing. My brain moving faster than my fingers, I churned out my first blog post in record time. I did not even review it; I just had to get it out there for people to see. Despite that I would never have been able to predict this life, here I am, an aspiring traveller and blogger, restricted to the borders of my college campus, using my blog to see the world through the lens of others who appreciate the true beauty of the Earth and the culture within it.