Travel

This is probably going to turn into one of those late-night, rambly, somewhat nonsensical posts, so here goes.

The other day I had an almost irresistible desire to drive up to Virginia to visit Assateague and Chincoteague islands. For the uninformed, the book 'Misty of Chincoteague' by Marguerite Henry made those islands famous by writing about their ponies and the yearly pony event. I've wanted to visit every since I was a kid, but never thought I would have the opportunity to do so. Until now.

I can't go now, for several reasons. (Lack of funds tops the list, quickly followed by not enough time on the way home from Florida, and rounded off with not having someone to drive 1,000 miles to the original commonwealth.) But I've been noticing lately a growing desire to travel and go places I've never been before, just to say I did.

First it was Colorado. Now it's Florida and doing things on my own when not watching nephews (I'm going to go riding here within the next week or so, and I'm terribly excited at the prospect.). Later, who knows? Maybe driving up to Minnesota to see one of the girls from this summer, maybe taking the thousand-mile trip to Virginia and the Assateague ponies, probably going back to Colorado at some point...my restlessness is breaking out in the form of wanderlust and this unexplainable, irresistible, terrifying feeling of freedom that comes from going on these crazy trips.

I can't even explain why I'm restless. It has something to do with feeling unfocused and unattached to anyone or anything...add in a dash of being tired of living in a place that I can only describe as a dead-end, and there you have it. Don't get me wrong, I love my home. But with my brothers gone and Colletta gone and my friends moving away and not having any really close friends nearby, it almost seems better to travel and be alone of my own accord, rather than being held there by some sense of duty or being trapped.

(I use strong words sometimes, but mostly because I'm not taking the time to find a better word. So when I say 'trapped' and the like, it's with a bit of hyperbole rather than truly feeling forced to remain where I am.)

Traveling probably isn't the answer to the loneliness, but the way I look at it: I'm not going to be in this stage of life forever. Nowhere else will I have the freedom to go where I like and do what I want (within reason, of course). And I anticipate settling down eventually, but while I can still travel, I figure it can't hurt to indulge the drifter within.

(I think this is the first time in over a year I've used pictures that aren't mine. O.o Tumblr and Pinterest are awesome for wandering/traveling pictures.)

Florida Again

 (Like my new blog template/color/everything? It was time to brighten up and not be so dark.)

Once again, I'm in the sunny state of Florida. This came something as a spontaneous trip when my brother told me about how Lydiana has been having awful morning sickness (really all-day sickness) that prevents her from being able to do very much around the house. She has the nausea from her 8th week of pregnancy to around the 20th week, and it's triggered by anything from a scent to a motion (riding in the car is NOT good) to claustraphobia. Suffice to say, it's pretty awful.

There was talk of her going to stay with her parents for a while, simply because she couldn't take care of the house, and I volunteered to come down for a while just to help out. So, on November 4th Isaac flew up to Peoria, I met him at the airport with my car, and we drove down to Florida.

I probably didn't NEED to take my car, but I love the autonomy that it gives me. Should there be an emergency or anything like that, I'll have it on hand. And I just wanted to road-trip, dangit. Do I need an excuse? XD

I'll be here til the first week of December, and then my friend Jean Marie and I will be driving up together. I haven't seen her for almost 2 years, so I'm excited to see her *and* have the time to truly catch up.

The road trip was a lot of fun, actually. Isaac and I road-tripped back in 2010 from Arkansas to Florida (a couple of months before he met his wife, actually) so it wasn't a foreign concept to us. We were prepared to pull an all-nighter as well; Isaac took the last leg of the journey and we pulled in right at 6 AM. Talk about exhausting...but it was totally worth it. I've now got the traveling itch. Sigh.

Florida has been pretty good to me this time around...it's not hot, and it's not cool. Going barefoot and wearing shorts is perfect and I love it. Though my experience with the season over the last month or so has been odd: October in Colorado was like mid/late fall, in Illinois it was like the beginning of fall, and in Florida it feels like late summer/early fall. (And now it's snowing back at home. Go figure.)

The boys are pretty dang cute too--last time I saw Ben he was crawling, and Wade wasn't saying much (at least, not much that was understandable). Now Ben is walking all over the place and Wade has a huge vocabulary that grows every day...I'm hoping to make a video of them soon, because pictures really don't do them justice.

In other news...when I go back home I'll be working at the gym in the evenings for sure. At first I was going to start in January, and the guy I'm replacing left a bit sooner than expected. If I wasn't here in Florida I'd be working this month...but oh well. The beginning of December works too. Gym-wise I'm toying with trying to do some heavy lifting training just for the heck of it, but we'll see if anything actually comes out of that.

And I'm obsessed with popsicles again. There's nothing like a homemade popsicle to dent hunger or a munchy mood...yum. 

With that said, I'll be back soon with pictures and (hopefully) a video. Here's another video that I made for transition practice a couple of weeks ago.