Bee T r avel
Generation Exotic!
CHRISTINE HICKS- USTA
Undeniably, I am a member of the boomer generation. I've been reading for years

about the influence of the baby-boom generation, not wanting to think I was following the crowd, but now thinking (on that wiser side of 49) that I must have been part of the trend, despite my protestations. I was reading my (gulp) AARP publication the other day, and it discussed how many of this (my) generation have made peace with Vietnam (but not Iraq) while a good many who were "hawkish" about 'Nam are not so inclined about Iraq. Such is the privilege of age; you can change your mind.

It may be you can change your mind, but some things are universally unchangeable. None of us gets younger. While we may say we're better (and maybe we are a little more about the wits), we, despite all our efforts, are really saying "I'm doing the best I can with what I have left."

This isn't a column about health or politics, though. It's about travel. What I've been reading about, too, is how this generation is now trending towards more exotic travel - Asia and the East. They also explore, in increasing number, destinations and experiences that benefit humankind. Maybe this is the outcome of a generation that wore flowers in our hair, and wanted to make love, not war. I think we're also finding out that sooner, rather than later, travel becomes, incrementally, - well - more burdensome. Not in that sense of carrying more, but in that sense of "how much longer can I..." and then you fill in the blank.

As I watch my own parents - who are both very much alive - struggle with what's generically called the "infirmity of age," I can no longer say (as I might have in my, say, 20s) that I won't be like that. The wisdom of age has caught and sacked that myth. Oh, I know you'll all write in and tell me about this ancient man/woman who bungee-jumped in New Zealand/climbed Mt. Everest/swam the English Channel. There is left and right to every bell curve, I will retort, the biggest bump representing "us."

So, when I woke up to discover a pain in my knees that wasn't there yesterday, just when I had made peace with the pain in my feet that started on an otherwise forgettable day years before that, it began to really reckon on me that time was not on my side as I perused my list of places yet to visit. Hmmm... On so many levels, this was not a good feeling.

So, Shangri-La is going on my list of places to visit. And all of us in that Flower Power generation ought to take a serious look at the exotic and strenuous now, rather than wait for retirement. I won't say that it's all downhill from here. But I will say that the trip, regardless up or down, is going to take a little longer. Do it while your knees still can.

(Christine Hicks-Usta has enjoyed more than 30 years of globetrotting as a member of the travel industry in various capacities. Direct questions to her at Bee Group Newspapers, P.O. Box 150, Buffalo, N.Y.