Start with this idea: "It's Possible."

Taking the leap while zip-lining with our friend Stella!

The grocery store clerk asked me what I was up to today.  I said, "Packing."  This led to my sharing with him that we are leaving home in a week to travel the world.

Most everyone says they are excited for us.  Some tell me about a time they traveled extensively or lived overseas.  

The rest say one or all of these things:

"I'm jealous!"

"I dream of doing that one day!"

"I wish I could do that!"

I say, "Well, you should!"  

Sometimes they smile.  Sometimes they look at me like, You are crazy...you have no idea how impossible that would be for me because of x, y & z.

For years Dave and I have traveled a lot.  Before we met, he went scuba diving and followed his favorite band all over the world.  When I was 29, I sold everything I owned and moved to Japan to teach English.  I also spent time in Mexico, and traveled alone to Hawaii and Europe.  In other words, we unknowingly were preparing for this moment.  Wherever you put your energy, there you are...

Also for the past few years, I've been looking at a lot of pictures of lovely places I want to visit and things I want to do.  I began cutting them out of magazines or printing them out, and pasting them into a scrapbook.  

When I came across that scrapbook recently, I realized most everything in it had come true:  I'd learned to ski and spent a lot of time in the mountains, we'd gone on several cruises, we'd ziplined and wine-tasted, we swam with dolphins and a manta ray, we'd enjoyed beautiful gatherings with friends old and new, and we'd gotten married on the beach in Hawaii...I'd gathered images of versions all of those things because I thought they were lovely, not because I was attached to them happening.  But indeed, they did.

Also the past few years, I've been reading a lot of blogs written by people who live a traveling life.  One couple rode their bikes from Argentina to Alaska...with their twin 8-year-old boys!  One family has lived in eight countries and grown their family by five children along the way.  One is a single woman who goes wherever the winds take her.  One followed her dream to move to Costa Rica without being exactly sure how it was going to work...and years later she takes people on whale and dolphin tours.

For a few years, when I'd bump into to my friend Tiffany at the California university where we both taught, she'd talk about loving to travel and wanting to teach overseas.  That desire, that focus, led to her living the dream when she got a job teaching in Korea.

There are so many ways to make the world your home.  Some people have specific jobs.  Some people make a living online. Some create new jobs where they are.  Some work a little here and there.  Some live on their life savings.  Some join the Peace Corps.  Some live happily on a shoestring.

I noticed that many people experienced a specific event to prompt them to change their lives:  loss of a job, a divorce, death of a loved one, an illness. 

Powerful stuff.  Then again, why wait for such a harsh reminder of the evanescence of life?

One thing all these travelers have in common is that they took the leap.  

So many of these people share their adventures online.  That's why the internet is such a great resource for how to get ideas to make it happen for you.

At the same time, no one can tell you how it can work for you.  You have to start with the idea that it's possible, without worrying about wrestling all the details to the ground.  

Start with the feeling, then the knowing, that you can create the life you want.  Then everything will start to fall into place.  

The minute you say, I'd love to do that, but I can't, you've roadblocked your dream.

Why not say, I'd love to do that! without attaching a "but"?  Focusing on your limitations makes them feel insurmountable.

Instead, use the magic of stories and pictures and conversations to inhabit your wishes.  If extended travel is what you crave, relish short road trips and live your daily life as though you are an adventurer.  Joyfully swimming around within the space of your desires will help your dreams to become your reality.

Wild about Cheryl and Dave

Cheryl Strayed's Wild, her captivating memoir about hiking the Pacific Crest Trail alone, is like potato chips.  Those yummy, addictive, thick-cut kind.  I've been eating for hours, the bag is still half-full, and I can't put it down.  Fortunately, unlike chips, the book isn't fattening.

Wild about Cheryl

We leave for Hawaii in two days.  I'm not packed.  Still have laundry to do. And this blog entry to write.  And eggs to stuff with poems. And I've completed only two of my four syllabi for fall.  I'm justifying my hours with the book because it's a fat hardback that would take up too much space in my carry-on.  I need to finish it so I can bring a small paperback instead.

As I read the book, I'm reminded of the only time I did something similar:  I once hiked alone for five hours across a volcano.  On the very island we are going to Monday to get married.

Wild about Dave

Then again, I suppose another similar event would be having sold everything I owned at age 29 and taking off to Japan alone to teach English.  My first taste of sushi was on the flight across the Pacific.  My first attempt to learn some Japanese phrases also occurred on that flight, as I was tutored by the passenger sitting next to me.  I was as unprepared for Japan as Cheryl was for the trail.  But I plunged off the cliff and, to paraphrase Ray Bradbury, my wings unfolded on the way down.

It's fun to be reminded of all of these life adventures now as I'm embarking on a lovely new chapter of my life:  Marrying Dave.  It's wonderful to be creating a life together, enriched by our combined 100 years of experience.  We've both had our "starter marriages" (okay, I've had two, but who's counting).  We've both traveled the world--often alone.  We've both been enriched on the journey of discovering what's important to us.

In other words, we come together as veterans of life, complete with scars and medals (dare I say Purple Hearts?) and the camaraderie of a rich group of friends. 

Forty of these friends will be with us in Hawaii.

Beach at A-Bay

Initially we thought our wedding would be a tiny affair--just Dave, me, and two witnesses with our toes in the sand.  We'd decided on this tact after we serendipitously discovered that at the same time we'd planned to be on the Big Island, his sister and brother-in-law would also be there.  Soon after we'd decided on north of Kona as our wedding spot, we sent out an Evite to some close friends and family  inviting them to join us if they were so inclined.  We had no expectations that more than four or five would come.  In fact, we let everyone know we'd have a one-year anniversary party in Santa Cruz next summer so we could all celebrate together.

Suddenly RSVP's were rolling in.  More people than we'd imagined were jazzed about a destination wedding.  Dave fantasized that we'd be able to stay with these friends in a beach-front locale, spend a lot of time together before and after the wedding.

So I contacted my friend Amy, who lives on the Big Island, to ask if she had some ideas.  She told me about a brand-new place being built on the very beach where I'd imagined getting married.  It wasn't open yet but would be by July.  She described it as beautiful, toes-in-the-sand, casual yet elegant.  She said Scott, the guy opening the place, was well-known on the island as an excellent restauranteur.

Lava Lava bungalow lanai

I contacted Scott who told me that the new Lava Lava Beach Club had an open-air restaurant, four bungalows, and a private party spot right on the beach.  Fast forward:  Our "non-rehearsal" dinner is taking place at the restaurant, our wedding and reception in the private party spot, and our friends have filled the bungalows. 

And how's this for another serendipity:  Dave's long-time friend Jim reconnected with a cousin who lives in Kona to tell her he'd love to see her again.  Turns out, this cousin is best friends with Scott, the Lava Lava Beach Club owner.  Now the cousin and her husband are joining us for the non-rehearsal dinner.

Jim told Dave and me that he's grateful that this wedding is reconnecting his family.  The wedding has also brought together two new couples.  One of Dave's long-time friends, and one of mine, have each invited a new amiga to Hawaii. 

And to top it off:  Two couples we'd invited had already tossed around the idea of coming to Hawaii to celebrate their joint 10-year wedding anniversaries.  So getting the Evite was like a message from the universe shouting, YES, do it!  Years ago, these couples met through each other.  The woman from one couple was the wedding officiant at the other couple's wedding.  And vice-versa, the man in the other couple officiated at the other wedding.  Each couple has a nine-year-old (one's a girl, one's a boy), who are best friends and will be throwing flower petals on everyone at our ceremony.

friends old and new

As if that's not enough...my sister threw me a GNO party (I'm too seasoned to call it a "bachelorette").  The limo-ride-wine-tasting-dinner-and-dancing bacchanalia brought together an array of my friends, creating a whole new web of interconnections.  In the aftermath, it's been fabulous to see all of them friending each other on Facebook.  The web expands!

The GNO event had quite a profound effect on my friend Daisy, which she wrote about so eloquently on her blog.  I'm flushed with gratitude as I read what she wrote.  She captured the fact that life experiences lead one to the next.

We get to choose:  Will the past drag us down, or will it enrich who we are? 

Aloha.

Better Than Prosac

I've now been with Mom for almost two weeks, helping her get back on her feet (literally and metaphorically) after my father's death. We now have two aides--two wonderfully caring and efficient women--who come to help her out mornings and evenings, setting Mom up to feel safe and cared for when I go back home.

This morning while the caretaker was with Mom, I went on a walk with my dog Max, my ipod on shuffle. The first song immediately lifted me up from listless to flying because of the beat--and because of a specific memory. When I was teaching in Japan, I'd blast this song and dance with all the five-year-olds, the music transcending our language and cultural barriers.



Then, serendipitiously as I was walking by my old high school (I graduated in 1980) this song came on. I could almost smell pot in the air.



Next came my favorite Indigo Girls song--love that Amy's raspy voice. It reminded me of one of the eight or so times we saw them in concert. We were sitting in the front row, and when Amy played the first note of this song I almost yelled out the song's title but chickened out, doubting myself. But then they launched into the song, and I kicked myself. I'm sure they would have been so impressed with a fan who could name one of their tunes in one note that they would have invited me on stage and given me kisses.




Great way to start my day. Now Mom and I are off to a bookstore. I want to wander among books, smell them, linger on a page, a cover, here and there. Books and music. Life is good.