Is it displacement activity if you're not supposed to be doing anything else?

[desperance]

The symptoms are easy to spot - complex cookery, shopping, restlessness, flitting from one project to another with an unhealthy dose of self-contempt - but all I'm trying to displace here is anxiety.

I talk to myself when I'm stressed (however much I try to pretend I'm talking to the cats). This last day or so I've been heard muttering "I want to go home." Which is demonstrably absurd, given that I am home. But tomorrow I shan't be, and I think I'm just getting my bad-traveller blues in early.

It is absurd to find myself in this condition; I'm only hopping over the Irish Sea for a happy weekend at a con, for cryin' out loud. I would cry "What's wrong with me?", but I know the answers all too well (see above, under "self-contempt").

Thing is, I actually like travelling, and I like being somewhere else; but I still get into this state beforehand, and frequently during. It's a kind of transition-anxiety, I think. I worry about crossing borders, literal and figurative both. Also, of course, I am English, and I fret about Doing The Wrong Thing. Lots.

I shall go into town now, and look in guidebooks to Dublin, and buy funny foreign money. Euros. You know, I've never handled a Euro? That's how little I travel. It's ridiculous.

Comments

[mizkit.livejournal.com]

I'm actually quite similar with regards to travelling. I like being other places. I do not especially like getting to other places, and I am usually in a terrible temper the day before travelling, no matter how minor the trip may be. I now try to mitigate this because it's obnoxious and poor Ted doesn't deserve me snarling, but yeah, right there with you.

You're in luck with the whole Being English and Doing Things Wrong, because Paul Cornell, our esteemed guest of honor, never does anything wrong but is absurdly apologetic to everyone and everything Irish simply for *being* English, so he's really already got all that covered for you. :)

[lagilman]

*sniffles about being left at-home -- especially since I actually love the whole traveling thing, and being American just assume I'm going to be blamed for screwing it up, anyway*

I hereby proclaim that you both will have a perfectly hassle-free travel-adventure, and a splendid time at the convention, and generally Not Stress. There. Done. *nods*

*goes back to the thing she's avoiding by being on LJ*

[cherylmmorgan.livejournal.com]

Fear not, buddy, auntie Cheryl will take care of you. I haz travel-fu.

[http://users.livejournal.com/la_marquise_de_/]

Dublin is lovely. It has vikings. There used to be a very good 50s style US diner on South Anne St, too (Eddie Rockets. They make their burgers in front of you).
I have travel provider anxiety -- I simply can't convince myself that airlines and their ilk can be trusted not to double-cross one, break their own rules and generally behave badly.
And you cannot possibly do the wrong thing. Dublin is a wonderfully relaxed place. The only sin I can think of its telling someone they're pouring your Guinness wrong. Which you won't do.

[shewhomust.livejournal.com]

You do know that etymologically Dublin is just Blackpool, don't you? How big a deal can that be? Crossing the water - hey, you cross the Tyne all the time, if you can handle South of the River, you can handle Blackpool...

Nah, I'm just jealous, of course.

[anef.livejournal.com]

It sounds a bit like the anxiety I get before parties where I don't know anyone, and it's at the other end of town, and I won't enjoy myself, so why bother. I probably shouldn't say this, but drink usually helps.

[bellinghman.livejournal.com]

But in this case, he will know other people there. Like us.