A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes

I've always loved airports despite my fear of flying.  When we were young my parents would take my sister and me to spend the afternoon watching airplanes take off and land and walking around the airport people watching.  My first career goal was to be a flight attendant, back when they were still called "stewardesses".  Little girls of my generation typically had traditional career goals like nurse, teacher, Mommy, and maybe nun if they were the product of Catholic school like I was.  A flight attendant seemed like such a glamorous occupation - those snazzy uniforms! 

Somehow, along the way of life, I made the traditional choices.  While I took the safer path, spending the last 15 years in a house 1 block from the house where I was born, I never gave up my dream of being an adventurer.  (My one television addiction is House Hunters Internationa.  How do those people have the guts to chuck it all and start a B&B in South America?).  I married a great guy and we successfully blended a family of 6 terrific kids.  When they grew up and spread their wings it seemed as if everyone was having an adventure but me.  I wanted my own adventure but couldn't see how to make it happen. 

During many long walks and over MANY glasses of wine a spark of possibility grew.  Maybe we could really make it happen.  But how? We didn't want to just vacation in a place for a couple of days, we wanted to get to know it in the way that locals do.  But that takes money.  And what about jobs? The only way to make it happen would be to sell our home.  But, sell our home?  Leave our friends? My sister and her family? Not an easy thing to do. 

We talked about our dream for years (over still more glasses of wine) and called it"The Plan".  We saved and we scrimped and we shared one car when our Volkswagen Jetta died an untimely death.  We put our house up for sale in a depressed real estate market and it sold in a week.  It seemed as if the Universe was saying, "Go!" 

And now the time is here. Time to make it happen and not just talk about it.  A road trip into the unknown.  We have a few destination spots in mind (kids, are you ready?) but for the most part we're committed to being modern day hoboes, letting the road take us where we need to go.  Look for us on the road. We'll be the ones in the silver car with the little dog and the stereo cranked way up.