The Mother Earth Collective
Words and Photography by Tabitha Coen
“Travel isn’t always pretty. It isn’t always comfortable. Sometimes it hurts, it even breaks your heart. But that’s OK. The journey changes you; it should change you. It leaves marks on your memory, on your consciousness, on your heart, and on your body. You take something with you. Hopefully, you leave something good behind.”
- Anthony Bourdain
The Faroe Islands make up a tiny place on the map, a place so small that some people can’t even point them out. But I can. I can point them out and I can tell you the differences. And I can tell you the differences in me, having been there when we were. One of the most untouched, breathtakingly beautiful places I’ve ever been and we had all the sites almost to ourselves. And while I could write about our itinerary or the hikes (the best hikes I’ve ever been on), or travel tips and why you should go in the off season like we did, I won’t. I’ll help keep the islands a little less known for now. A so-far-unspoilt, best kept secret of the Atlantic that it is, for as long as possible.
And I could write about COVID19, how we were on the islands when the outbreak began to hit Europe hard, when borders started to close, and when being a foreigner began to feel odd. For the first time being a traveler in a foreign land felt taboo. Like we should just go home. And I could write about cutting our trip short when we found out we could no longer enter the countries that were our next planned stops. About how we heard from locals that the planes might be grounded any day, and we might get stuck for over 30 more. I could write about our journey home, how disappointingly terrible it was to interact with the airlines, how kind and helpful the people at Copenhagen’s airport were, how oblivious everyone at the airport in London seemed, and how unprepared and unorganized our greeting back to the US and the CDC’s “screening” process for the virus was.
I could write about being back in the United States and the mismanagement of this entire thing. I could write about the uncertainty of what the future, or even the next few months, holds for us. I could write about being stuck inside instead of traveling to far away lands that were on my bucket list.
But I won’t.
Because travel in the first place is a modern day privilege of the world we knew just a few short weeks ago. Like so much else about our normal lives that’s been suddenly stripped away, I recognize that. The way we’ve been so lucky in getting to explore the corners of the world that we have, something that I’ve never once taken for granted, and something that I never will. And when this all blows over, however long from now that is, life as we knew it will slowly resume. We will go back to being citizens of the world and not just of a single nation. And the hope is that we will all hold each other a little closer. Collective cheers to our fellow humans in all the beautiful languages will be heard across the lands. We will once again celebrate cultures, death, new beginnings, and being alive.
And maybe there will be more of it, more celebrating. Maybe there will be less arguing, and more coming together; something we won’t take for granted again. Because Mother Earth has sent her message loud and clear. She needs us to stop being so damn careless. She is demanding more gentleness, more compassion - for her and for each other. She is using this time to heal what damage we’ve done to her that she still can. And we are using it to hopefully, change.
To stop looking through each other when we pass on the streets. Once we can stop the social distancing and the constant worry that someone outside of your own home could spread the virus - To see each other more fully than ever. To go a step further and recognize other living creatures on this planet as well - and to respect them as such. To realize that this is a global crisis, that we are all in this together. And if that’s not the attitude of those leading us, then it’s time to stand up and move, ourselves and each other, forward.
Because we can be better than we were. Maybe it doesn’t feel like it right now, but things can be better than they were last year, last month, even yesterday.
I don’t think I made a difference to the Faroe Islands, but the Mother Earth I encountered there made a difference to me. And I could write about that even more specifically, but I won’t.
I’ll just leave this here and hope for a difference on the other side of this. For something good - for human kind and the earth we call home and all her creatures - collectively.
