San Diego...Our Home

There is a saying that all great outcomes begin with the end in mind.  I have spent my entire life executing this technique to the best of my ability.  I honestly have been blessed so many times from this ability to strategize and build plans that yield great results.  I have put together plans for work of course and also plans for retirement. I can't forget about all those plans for my marriage and my kids too.  I have plans for vacations I will take and then when I am on the vacation...oh boy do I have plans! I have plans for big purchases and plans to cut back and plans to eat better and plans to relax.  Everything should always work out as planned...but what happens when it doesn't?  

In me, it settles as disappointment. The time wasted or the money gone or that never showed up.  I stress out as I monday morning quarterback to see where I dropped the ball and I scrutinize my failings. This is where I also strive to only see the positives and create plans to fill in the gaps next time as a parting gift to my unfulfilled spirit.  And then the worst part comes when you realize all of the people who were rooting for you that you also let down.

When Erica and I began seriously discussing taking this trip around January of 2017 we decided that a practice run at vacationing without plans would be a perfect way to test ourselves.  Talk about a scary process.  Erica was much more and always has been a free spirit when it comes to taking big leaps of faith.  I, on the other hand usually have a process that needs...well, processed! 

First, we requested our kid's inservice week off school in February from work and committed to packing up my truck with enough clothes, goods and camping gear for 9 days.  What would normally be the next step, for not only me but Erica too, would be hours and hours of detailed planning to include at minimum purchasing hotels or campsites and tourist destinations we would stop at along our route.  That, we didn't do. We decided not to plan a single thing until the night before we left. We knew if we couldn't find a hotel or campsite we might be in trouble.  What is the worst that could happen we thought?  It would have to be Erica and I trying to sleep sitting up in my small tacoma truck bucket seats all night while the kids scream and cry from being cramped and tired in the back seat. Thats highly likely to happen one night out of the eight we told ourselves but we could deal.  So we left on a Saturday morning and returned nine days later after having the trip of our life together.  We saw places that would have never come up on top 3 lists in trip advisor but were actually incredible places the locals recommended.  Because we had no agenda, we were able to go to Tombstone Arizona and then head to Carlsbad Caverns National Park without worry about getting checked into a hotel near the park.  We saw Old Town, Albuquerque and we got to spend a day at the 50,000 year old meteor crater in Northern Arizona that I never even knew existed before that day. We drove until we were tired and pulled into the local sleeping spots.  Best of all, we were never disappointed!  We were grateful that we had our freedom to adventure.  This is when the wanderlust took hold big time.

As we set out on our adventure today, the day we have been waiting for over a year to come, I am reminded of that feeling of wanderlust.  We don't know where we are staying tonight and we hope to find some cool little spots along our route to take a break and stretch our legs.  While this trip is without planning in many of my traditional methods, it is not without planning completely.  We plan to do what we want, when we want, and how we want. We plan to continue to push ourselves to be as present as we can be so we don't miss those sweet things that pop into our life unexpectedly.  We are sure to not be disappointed every time we plan to experience something culturally different too. This morning we honor this by attending a muslim mosque with some of our closest friends Elham, Amir and their daughter Hajar to celebrate the end of Ramadan.  I look forward to the learnings for myself, Erica and the kids.  

So many people wonder if Erica and I will find ourselves wandering back to San Diego at the end of our trip.  I will say what I have always said, we are not going to begin with the end in mind on this but there is a huge likelihood that we will.  Of all the places we have wandered, San Diego has been a dream come true.  We fell in love with the beauty of this city eight years ago on a quick getaway trip between the births of Boyd and Blythe. When Boyd was nine months old he learned to walk on that trip.  Erica was pregnant with Blythe but still told me to fly back home while she stayed here.  I was ordered to quit my job, pack up the house and come back out.  That didn't happen but we spent the next two years dreaming and waiting for a job opportunity.  It finally happened and we have been living in the most beautiful city on earth since. The dream has been enriched by meeting so many wonderful kind and loving people to share our lives with.  Fostering a sense of community has become a top priority for us now. We have never felt so at home and we realise now, having said our goodbyes, that we will miss our community of friends so much that we will most likely be drawn to wander back to this home in the end.  Stay tuned!

Peace and Love!