Post by Charles
The first thing I hear is “that’s so neat!” quickly followed by “how can you afford that”.
I think you can use your imagination to understand why it would be considered such an awesome adventure. However you may be wondering the same thing – “How can that guy afford that” or “I could never afford that”.
So, let me put you mind to rest. I am not independently wealthy. I’ve never even appeared on “Lifestyles of the Rich & Famous”. Instead, I’ve become what I once abhorred.
I have always been a rule follower. I appreciate discipline and structure. I’ve worked since I was 12 years old and I value responsibility. In fact, the thing I disliked the most was the opposite. I’ve always tried to be kind and understanding but let’s face it, Hippies are a bunch of irresponsible bums. You should get a job, get married, buy a house, have kids, grow old, die….what’s so hard to figure out – you long haired no-account bums?
OK, so I’m trying to be funny but maybe there’s some truth in how I used to feel.
That slowly started to change a few years ago. I looked at the world, my peers, what everyone thought was the way to do things and I saw a lot of unhappy, divorced, sad or angry people. I love working and what I do, but I started to think ‘what if I couldn’t or if I didn’t? What would I do then?’ Be careful when you head down that path!
My wife and I had to think hard because we didn’t know of any other way. As we did, we started to think about what we liked doing – and that was moving, experiencing, doing – not having. The sacrifices we made for our 6 children were nothing beyond what any loving parent has made to provide a secure home, opportunities and valuable experiences to become healthy productive adults….but what do you do when they’ve all grown up and moved away?
First, 30 years of marriage and 20 years of living in the same place, had created quite a collection of ‘things’. There’s nothing wrong with things but having them certainly prevented us from getting what we valued more highly – a life of adventure, so we started divesting ourselves of those things.
Second, we had a home on 20 acres in Southern Lancaster County that had to be maintained. While that was a perfect place to raise children, and a wonderful place to live, this again came to be viewed as a blocker of our new desired life.
Finally, while our careers were necessary, they became another reason why we couldn’t do what we wanted. My wife, a nurse, chose to become a travel nurse. And after working for a solid 30 years, I realized that while continual employment is a security, it can also rob you of the adventure and freedom. I decided to focus only on short term and/or remote contracts.
Please note, for years we’d been a single income family. And while we tried to be wise, we too foolishly took on debt. When my wife returned to the workforce we decided first to continue to live on only one income and second, to eliminate our debt. Since she was working this happened a lot quicker than if we’d still had only one income.
Once this was accomplished it was easy to budget to live off my wife’s income alone. Which means a hiatus would not impact us financially. To be sure, there are other impacts of taking an ~3 month ride across America but I’ll leave that to another blog.