The Key West Citizen

WASHINGTON (P) Suppose you were offered a free trip to Europe - to any place this side of the Iron Curtain you wanted to go. Which country or countries would you pick?

Nine out of 10 people will give you an answer to that question as quick as a wink. I know because I've already asked nine. You're the 10th.

It's fun to dream about foreign travel, and everybody has a favorite dream. Maybe it's of drifting down the Grand Canal in a gondola. Or of assassinating grouse on a Scottish moor. Or of making an on-the-spot check to see if Paris night life is as wicked as it's painted.

But let that dream become reality and you've got a problem on your hands.

I know because I've just been offered a free trip to Europe, and I can't for the life of me decide where in Europe to go.

How come I get a free trip?

Well, I took some pictures of my little boy, dropped the roll at the corner drugstore and then, out of a clear sky, a man called up and said:

"Congratulations. You have won the grand prize in our contest. When do you want to leave for Europe?"

(Tip to other amateur photographers: to win a prize you must have three things - a camera, a little boy who will make faces in front of it, and a lot of luck).

Anyhow, as soon as the numbness wore off, I started planning the trip I would take. And, while I won't pretend I'm not enjoying myself, the problem of where to go is driving me nuts.

The World Today

out a name on your list of happy possibilities, it hurts.

England, for instance. Haven't been there since 1947, and it would be fine to go back. Same with France. But wouldn't it be better to strike out for some new place? Or would it?

There are all sorts of places a Washington reporter, who often has to write about foreign affairs, could visit with profit. I once learned more about French communism by arguing for half an hour - pocket dictionary in hand - with a rag-picker in Paris than in months of reading about it in the papers.

So Berlin might be a good place to go. Or Austria. The problems of that neck of the woods are going to be with us a long time.

But golly, a man doesn't want to work all the time. He wants to do some sightseeing. So how could you leave out Rome? Or Venice? Or Athens?

What about Scandinavia? The Low Countries? Too cold and rainy with winter coming on? So is Washington cold and rainy.

Of course the sun would be glorious in Seville. Or in Sicily. And from Sicily maybe you could manage a quick trip to North Africa.

But if you go that far you'd hate to miss Egypt, and there you're only a stone's throw from Jerusalem... and Istanbul... and

You see the problem? It's enough to give a man an anxiety neurosis.

My friends are not sympathetic. They tell me I am looking a gift horse in the mouth and complaining because it isn't an elephant.

Maybe they're right.

All I know is that I wish I could make up my mind. My wife does too. She's tired of having the living room cluttered up with travel folders.