The little<\/i> motel where we\u2019re staying in Port Alberni on Vancouver Island is just down the street from the storage locker we\u2019ve rented.\u00a0 It will be home to all our \u2018stuff\u2019 until we figure out what we\u2019re going to do next.<\/i><\/p>\n
The car is packed with what we\u2019ll be living with for the next \u2018who knows how long,\u2019 until we find our way into our next step:\u00a0 2 suitcases with clothes, toothbrushes, deodorant, a few favourite earrings, etc; 2 backpacks with laptops, iPad (of course!), iPod (Yep.\u00a0 Gotta have tunes for a road trip), digital camera (more important than the toothbrush), an inflatable bed with sheets & pillows (important to get a good night\u2019s sleep along the way to wherever it is we\u2019re going). And if we end up experimenting with living in a foreign country where it\u2019s cheaper to live than Canada or the US, we have all the basics we can get onto an airplane without paying for extra luggage.<\/i><\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
We\u2019re going on the road. To visit with family and friends with an open-ended schedule and without even the slightest clue of where we\u2019re going next or what we\u2019re going to do.\u00a0 We have enough of the \u2018necessary evil\u2019 stuff to put gas in the car to get from one place to another, food in our bellies and a tiny nest egg to, hopefully, carry us through on our next journey. \u00a0We definitely need a long term plan, but so far, neither one of us has a clear picture of what that looks like. \u00a0It\u2019s intoxicating, actually. We only know we\u2019re driving off into an unknown adventure as if we\u2019re both 25 instead of retirement age.\u00a0 Yeah.\u00a0 I know.\u00a0 You\u2019d think we both fell off the last turnip truck and hadn\u2019t been around the proverbial block a time or two.\u00a0 Irresponsible comes to mind, doesn\u2019t it?\u00a0<\/i><\/p>\n
But if we\u2019re going to live this life as fully engaged and\u00a0passionately\u00a0as we\u2019re hungry to\u00a0–\u00a0to actually live this love affair with life as if we weren\u2019t going to get out alive (hmmm\u2026 now there\u2019s a thought), to savor more juice and flavor in life than we have been\u2026 then for us, it\u2019s time to get on with it. \u00a0We have absolutely no reason\u00a0(since life\u2019s little surprise of the vanishing job) not to embrace this opportunity with gusto!<\/i><\/p>\n
As we\u2019re organizing and moving things into the storage unit from the scattered piles in front of the gaping door, my eyes are repeatedly drawn up to the sapphire blue sky. \u00a0The high, summer clouds are drifting in the light, summer breeze that\u2019s cooling the afternoon heat. \u00a0Looking up, it’s easy to keep reminding myself that we don\u2019t have to be done today \u2013 or tomorrow, or any day in the foreseeable future. \u00a0We can take as long as we want. Funny how foreign that feels.\u00a0 No deadlines, no five year business plan, strategic marketing plan, no PR, no Google analytics, no measurables other than getting everything to fit into this 10\u2019x20\u2019 storage unit so we can close and lock the door and drive off into the sunset. \u00a0Or maybe sunrise is a more appropriate picture in this instance.<\/i><\/p>\n
Gazing up at the fathomless, imaginary worlds in the clouds, I felt for the first time in a very long time, maybe since I was a kid, what it feels like to not \u2018have to\u2019.\u00a0 To have all the time I want to look at clouds and let my mind drift along with them. \u00a0Is it a teapot?\u00a0 An elephant?\u00a0 A dragon? \u00a0To lay back and read a book I like with no rush to finish, to think about anything I want to think about without the stress-worm gnawing away at my insides to get off my lazy duff and get done whatever it is I HAVE TO get done.\u00a0<\/i><\/p>\n
I felt what it might be like to breathe, just breathe.\u00a0 Soak up the simple beauty of just being alive for no other reason than to delight in it.\u00a0 Like I said, there might be a lot more to this adventure than I expected.\u00a0<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The little motel where we\u2019re staying in Port Alberni on Vancouver Island is just down the street from the storage locker we\u2019ve rented.\u00a0 It will be home to all our \u2018stuff\u2019 until we figure out what we\u2019re going to do…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":841,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-840","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mbear.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/840","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mbear.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mbear.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mbear.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mbear.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=840"}],"version-history":[{"count":22,"href":"https:\/\/mbear.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/840\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1245,"href":"https:\/\/mbear.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/840\/revisions\/1245"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mbear.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/841"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mbear.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=840"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mbear.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=840"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mbear.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=840"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}