It Feels Like Sinking When I'm Standing in One Place: How This All Began
Ever since I found out that a travel writer was an actual job, I have dreamed of doing nothing else. It took my husband years to get me to admit that my ultimate passion in life is writing. Of course, as an artist, I am constantly battling thoughts of inadequacy as well as the impossibilities of doing it as an actual j-o-b, but he is right. I love to write, and read, and help others share their stories.
The first thing I do when I get a new book is smell it…
I love it all.
I was 26 years old when I heard that there are people out there who get PAID to travel the world and just write about it- holy cow!! Sign me up! But as a young mother, I couldn’t imagine uprooting my life with a new husband and a new baby to live like hippies jumping from country to country. I mean, how irresponsible, right? Little did I know, that there are families all over the world doing a little something called, World Schooling. Yep. These parents, literally, travel the world with their kids and guide them through their education while seeing the world. Doing a unit on the Roman empire? Cool, next stop- Rome! Want to learn more about marine wildlife? Let’s go scuba diving and see it firsthand! My mind and heart were completely blown away. The icing on the cake was when I noticed THE FAMILIES WROTE ABOUT THEIR EXPERIENCES!
On one hand, I was completely sold on the idea, but on the other hand, it felt utterly irrational. My husband asked very logical and fair questions like, “How would we pay for it?”. Jeeze…way to burst my bubble with logic. I don’t know? I can’t be bothered with simple questions as I daydream of visiting animal sanctuaries and exploring real castles with my children. He was right, though. We did not have the financial means to do such a crazy thing.
And just as quickly as it arrived, my dream floated away. I promised I would revisit it when we eventually won the lottery…that I never play.
Our family was quickly on the traditional American route: get a 9-5 job, buy a house, send the kids to school, so on and so on. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that lifestyle. My immigrant parents sacrificed and dreamed of that for our family for years. I consider it a privilege that I even have the freedom to choose now.
But for me, that dream always felt like an old shirt from junior high that just won’t fit anymore: too tight, suffocating, and no longer my style.
Personally, stability doesn’t sit well with me and by stability I mean staying put in one place for too long. I’ve traveled a lot and have seen enough to know that the outside world is worth exploration. I moved to the big city of Chicago as soon as I could and thank goodness for it being a world-class city, tons of excitement, and things to explore! But like Elsa, the call of adventure into the unknown always haunts me….Ahh uhhh uuh ahhh! (I had to…I’m a mom to little girls).
It grew even louder as COVID-19 hit.
Just like many other families, we were forced to reevaluate our decisions, our lifestyle, and our priorities. My husband lost his job a month before quarantine was enacted in the city. Thanks to God, he found a new one just in time to spend one day in the office before he was directed to work remotely for the foreseeable future. Our eldest daughter virtually wrapped up Kindergarten while we held our breath in anticipation for our new future. I have been a stay-at-home Mom for the past 6 years with some freelance editing/writing jobs sprinkled in here and there, but being the person that I am, I was never just at home everyday. So quarantine life was tough. My husband and I were in the toughest point of our marriage- ever, and we had just been forced to spend every waking moment together. God sure enjoys irony. Any tiny sliver of my past dream to travel with my family was completely gone because now, I didn’t like them very much and the whole world was closing.
But the beautiful thing that the Lord does with the burnt up ash of what could have been, is He knows exactly when to ignite something better inside of us.
After weeks of wallowing over how much everything sucked, I paused and saw with new eyes: we are healthy, we have jobs, we have a home, we have a BACKYARD, and we have each other.
I know 2020 has brought tragedy after tragedy. It will go down as the year we all learned too much too fast. But being the optimist that I am, I was determined to find some silver lining in all of the grey. My husband got word that he wouldn’t have to be at the office in person until at least mid-January. We made the crazy hard decision to homeschool our girls (NOT remote e-learning but actual homeschool where the parent builds the curriculum and teaches the child) and we had nothing keeping us from having to stay put. So naturally, I thought, why not buy a camper, fix it up, and do work/school on the road safely over the holidays? We could see family and friends that we haven’t visited in years, we could go to different national parks and explore with our daughters, escape a couple cold Chicago months, and I could remain some sort of sanity by not being in the same place for too long, WHILE WRITING ABOUT IT!!!
My husband was surprisingly on board, if not more pumped about it than me. He normally has to talk me down from my crazy ideas, but the first ‘rona quarantine gave him some new found clarity as well.
And so began this new chapter. We did it. We bought a camper off Facebook marketplace (no joke) and we are currently working on fixing it up so we can wander the country in the midst of history. My hope is that WHEN this all passes, we can look back and be thankful for the time and how we spent it. I am probably romanticising it all too much but I guess we’ll just have to wait and see. What could go wrong, right? ;)
