When I was younger, I got the opportunity to travel. My family had the means to take vacations and I even studied abroad. I spent a year in Denmark which was life-changing and shaped who I am today.
While my husband and I have never had a lot of money, we used to take a lot of road trips, mostly before we became parents. We would travel to art shows and gaming conventions (my husband is a huge D&D nerd), but sometimes we were spontaneous; we would just take off.
I really miss that.
My husband and I work really hard, but vacations are just not financially feasible right now. We like exploring parks in the area and local events – Toledo actually has a lot to offer – but I just want to see someplace different. I want to get on the road with no real destination. I want to buy toothbrushes at the gas station because this trip wasn’t planned.
When I ship artwork to shows, I spend a lot of time thinking about the location to which I’m sending it. Oh, how I would love to go to every opening and explore a new area!
I’m an anxious person, dependent on routines and a creature of habit, but lately, I just wish I had more excitement and adventure in my life. Have you ever felt that way?
I have hope. I believe my family’s financial situation will improve. I would love to travel with my daughter. She hasn’t had many chances to experience that, and that makes me sad. Some of my favorite childhood memories are of traveling.
I can only hope that one day my daughter gets her own “year in Denmark.”
So let’s daydream together! Where would you like to travel to? Or tell me about an interesting place you have been.
My father was in the military and we moved every 18 months – 3 years except for the double-tour he got in Hawaii. The only times I spent in the continental USA before my junior year of high school was Florida when I was a toddler. I loved growing up all over the place and wouldn’t have changed it for the world. My longest and best friend (another military brat) and I met at the age of 2, in Japan, and our paths crossed so many times that we were in each other’s weddings and are godparents to each other’s kids, but I have other friends who I met because our paths crossed growing up and we’re still friends.
I’ve lived in the same place now for a number of years and sometimes it gets tedious. I wish for the open roads, the open water, the open skies (but planes are flying Covid traps–and that’s when pieces don’t fall off mid-flight or the planes sit grounded because of bad software updates).
Travel exposes you to so much–different ways of eating and thinking and behaving.
It sounds like you’re busy now with two jobs and school is starting up again for your daughter, and you have a lot of pets at home to consider. Yup, sometimes adulting sucks. 🙁 I like that you take day trips.
[When I reread what I wrote below, it sure sounds like I’m bragging. That’s not my intent; but I have done a good bit of travel; and I want to agree with you that travel is a Good Thing.]
I’m fortunate that I can still serve on an ISO standards committee for the C++ programming language and can afford the travel; and I’ve attended meetings in Copenhagen, Denmark; Cologne, Frankfurt and Berlin*, Germany; Delft, The Netherlands; Curaçao, Netherlands Antilles; Madrid, Spain; Varna, Bulgaria; London, Oxford, Bristol and Belfast, UK; Toronto, Ontario; Mont Tremblant, Québec; and numerous cities, large and small, in the U.S. including Kailua-Kona, Hawaiʻi.
In November, I hope to be able to make it to Wrocław, Poland with a three-day conference the week before in Berlin and a one-day conference in Wrocław the Monday after. As you can see from one possible itinerary, a big part of the fun for me is riding on trains.**
For the Belfast trip, I thought it would be Really Cool to make the whole trip on the surface; and I took the Queen Mary 2 both directions across the Pond.
Now that I’m retired, I don’t care how long the trip takes. 😎
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*This was shortly after reunification. One of the members gave us a tour of a Stasi prison, and I had nightmares for a couple of days after that.
**Either of the two trains that I’d take to the East Coast stop in Toledo, the Capitol Limited early morning westbound and late night eastbound, and the Lake Shore Limited early morning westbound and in the wee hours of the morning eastbound.