Tag: reflections

This Is Living

Thoughts From 10 Days in My Hometown

Posted on by Lis

Earlier this Summer, I shared with you some reflections I had during a road trip I took from Washington State to Los Angeles. After said trip, I hopped on a plane to New York. This flight kicked off my July and August on the East Coast. During that time, I’ve traveled up to New England, down to the South, and back again… an adventure I’ll write about in future posts. Before this adventure started, however, I spent 10 days in my hometown. It’s this stint I want to reflect on today. Here goes!

Balancing adventure time with staying still time is important

When I arrived in upstate NY, one of the very first things I noticed was my need to stay put. I had a great desire to not leave my parents’ house. Normally, I’d try to get out at least once or twice to see old friends and family, but not this go around. I simply wanted peace and quiet. Luckily, staying in a town where cell service still isn’t reliable was just the place to fill this requirement.

In reflection, I saw that all the energy I expended on the road needed to be balanced out, and boy am I glad I took the time.

This isn’t my home anymore

This was a big one! Despite all the peace and quiet being helpful, I finally recognized it wasn’t on my terms. I saw that my parents live here 24 hours a day / 7 days a week / 52 weeks a year. Who am I to come in and request they not start lawn mowing at 7 in the morning so I could get more sleep? Who am I to ask that they free up the bathroom in the mornings so I could get ready for work? I used to be a resident here, but I’m clearly not anymore.

Don’t get me wrong, I have stayed at my parents for days and weeks on end a time or two during the past 18 years of my life. However, this time around I connected with the fact that I simply don’t live here anymore and I no longer have any sort of say in what goes on in the house. It’s not my place to make requests or to change anyone else’s routine. I saw how before when I would come back to visit, I would slide back into my roll as a child living in the house. This time I recognized how this slide no longer serves me (it probably never did) and I pulled back on it right quick.

This meant recognizing that when I’m here I’m a guest who has to maneuver my time around the routines and constructs of my parents. This is something I’m finding increasingly frustrating, which also means it’s something I’ll be addressing in future visits (either by staying somewhere else or preparing my schedule differently).

In addition, I saw this small town also wasn’t my home anymore. Yes, I grew up here, have a great deal of family still here, and can probably go into many of the local establishments and be recognized, but I simply do not hold dear the same values and beliefs of the surrounding community. My world has shifted, and my points of view along with it. I’m a visitor here, and knowing this makes me feel both excommunicated and liberated.

I’m not sure where these realizations will take me, but I am sure recognizing them is important (and probably something I should have done long, long ago).

We grow up and we grow apart. That’s OK.

Going along with the above themes, I also realized how much I’ve grown apart from those I spent much of my childhood and young adult years with. I attended a wedding shower for a friend I’ve known since pre-school and felt fraudulent for doing so. Having gone many places and done many things in my life without having my hometown friends around me, I suppose this feeling only makes sense. We aren’t on the same pages anymore. This doesn’t mean we don’t love each other, it’s just a reality of being an adult who leaves.

I know the sooner I own and accept this fact, the lighter and more prepared for additional growth I’ll be.

In Conclusion

On July 1st my friend and I started our East Coast road trip which will be featured in the next installment of this blog. Until then, I find myself in this sort of limbo between who I was, who I am, and who I want to be. I suppose this limbo is what living life is all about, though. Who knew?

This Is LivingTravel

Lessons Learned from My West Coast Road Trip

Posted on by Lis

Prologue

Earlier this year I decided to put aside a life tethered to a physical address and head out to parts “kind of” known. I didn’t, and still don’t, have any concrete plans on what this means. But, given that I can work from anywhere, I figured why not try to see as much of the world as I can? The West Coast Road trip I talk about below was my first official adventure where I didn’t have an address to return to.

The Story

One month ago, I sat in a cottage in White Salmon, WA preparing myself for what was next. OK… that statement is only partly true. I was in part preparing; but, as usually occurs before any of my major life changes, one of my best friends was visiting and we were spending an awful lot of time enjoying Memorial Day weekend in the Columbia River Gorge instead. Not only was I enjoying friend time, but I was soaking up as much of the Gorge as I could before hitting the road. Come June 2, my best friend and I would start our road trip to Los Angeles. It was there where I’d be storing my car for the Summer as I headed back East for a few months.

I’m writing to you from the other side of our journey to share some points of reflection and lessons learned in hopes they can be helpful to someone else… or at least be somewhat entertaining. Here goes:

The Trip

Let me start by laying out our route for you geography fans out there:

  • Bend, Oregon – June 2
  • Klamath Falls, Oregon – June 3
  • Redding, California – June 4
  • Kelseyville, California – June 5 & 6
  • Alameda, California – June 7 thru 14
  • Monterey, California – June 15
  • Templeton, California – June 16
  • Santa Barbara, California – June 17
  • Los Angeles, California – June 18 & 19
  • Flight to Newark, NJ – June 20
A map of our route down the west coast.
Here’s more or less our route from White Salmon, WA to Playa Vista, CA.

Back To the Story

Traveling just for the sake of exploration was wonderful. I got to see much of the West Coast states which I hadn’t seen before, and I got to try some delicious food and drink along the way. In fact, one of the main reasons we drove through Kelseyville was so we could be in position to stop at Russian River Brewing to pick up a couple of bottles of a “hard to find on the East Coast” beer for my friend’s brother. We even bought a cooler to store said beer in for the remainder of our trip! So yeah, food and drink were a priority.

Two bottles of Pliny the Elder on a park bench.
The “hard to find on the East Coast” beer.

On the down side, much of my adventure time was spent hunched over a computer working. Don’t get me wrong, I was grateful for the work. But, I do wish I had more time to explore. Despite the work focus, however, I was still able to gather some lessons learned.

1. Stop Working and Adventure a Bit

Perhaps one lesson learned that stays top of mind is my desire to better integrate my work and my life. Living alone in a new town with few friends for the past couple of years (or on a tropical island with few friends), I forgot and ignored my tendency to focus solely on work and not one bit on myself and my life. Thus, having a friend along to remind me to stop and enjoy was essential to breaking me out of my work flow. Along the road trip I had several opportunities to practice relaxing instead of working. The Universe even shut off the Wifi a time or two to force me to chill out.

Lesson Learned: Work will get done. Making work my sole focus holds me back and means me missing out on life happening around me.

Lis playing pinball.
I would have missed out on the Pinball Museum in Alameda, had I not taken my head out of my work.

2. It Will All Be Fine

Usually when traveling I’ll prepare at least where I’ll be staying somewhat in advance of the trip, but for this trip we often didn’t know where we were going or staying until a week or even a few days beforehand. In fact, our original route took us through Big Sur, but a few days before we were to venture there we decided to take another route. This was somewhat anxiety provoking, but also VERY liberating! In the end, even with last minute planning, it was all just fine. Take that, anxiety!

Another example of things being fine even when you worry they won’t be happened as we pulled up to our motel near Kelseyville. Let’s just say the location and clientele out front didn’t make us feel as secure as we were used to (after traveling through “Be Nice, Oregon”). In the end, the place clean, the people nice, and the price was right. We were fine. Everything was just fine.

Sticker that says Be nice... you're in Oregon.
A sticker we saw reminding us of where we were.

Not surprisingly, and quite purposefully, we also met a lot of strangers along our way. On the surface meeting new people while in new surroundings can be scary. In reality, there was not one person we met who was dangerous or even unkind.

Lesson Learned: Give new people, places, and circumstances the chance you’d want to be given. Learning about them and learning to be with them is a huge part of the journey.

3. A Need to Travel More Intentionally

Between having so much work and needing to reach Los Angeles by a certain date, I really didn’t get to see and do as much as I wanted. In the future, I aim to get more intentional about my adventures and to travel more slowly. I believe doing so will help me to be more present and find more enjoyment in my travels.

Lesson Learned: Remain observant and aware. Listen to what you’re trying to tell yourself then apply the lesson.

Morro Rock
Reflections at Morro Rock.

Now, I have a couple of weeks of “stay in one place” time before kicking off a month of road tripping the East Coast with the same friend… yay! I plan on taking the lessons I’ve shared here with me as I go. I do all of this in an effort to architect and live my best life. With that, let’s see how this next step of the adventure pans out. Wish me luck!

Toasting two margaritas
To what lays behind us AND ahead of us!