Celebrating and Acknowledging Two Years of Being Nomadic ~ read the first part of this journey HERE.
For as long as I can remember, I have wanted to travel. In the early days, I think it was more about the idea of traveling; I don’t think I really understood what traveling was all about from a practical perspective. But, whatever it was that Past Me had in mind, the important element was the Commitment to An Idea.
Fast forward to 2021. Our youngest child moved out of home, in between COVID lockdowns, in Melbourne. As she moved out, I was packing up the house ready for us to move when we could. At that point in time, we had planned to move into a rental property in the city (Melbourne) so that David (husband) could walk to work ~ after 25+ years of a one hour, or longer, each way commute to the office, it was time for us to make things easier.
Then, something awesome happened.
We realised that the Work From Home directive was still in place. That meant we could literally Live Anywhere. The expectation of a 6-12 month rental, in one place, changed to choosing where we wanted to live and having the opportunity to live in a variety of locations.
The Plan and the Pivot(s)
Remember the Past Me who made a commitment to the IDEA of traveling? As our kids grew up and moved out of home, that Idea began to take shape into something that looked like a plan. Ok, it was a LOT of years before the plan became a PLAN but as someone who Looks Ahead a lot, I had already realised that things needed to change in the World of Michelle. My “job” as an At Home Mum was disappearing and I needed something else to do.
The first step in my newly forming plan was to throw out an idea to David: what if we sold the house, put most of the money away for another house purchase (downsizing was becoming our focus, as our youngest was finishing school), and keep a small chunk aside for travel?
That was the first, and maybe biggest, challenge to our relationship.
At that point in time, the Plan (expectation!!) was that we’d always own a house and that we’d need all our money to buy the new, smaller home and live a fabulous life.
Pivot #1: recognising the way we’ve always seen or expected life to look and changing it up … in little increments for David; in pretty much one big step for Me. [wink]
Jumping ahead to Right Now (as I write), we regularly check in with the choices we’ve made regarding being nomadic. Every single time our response to the question: are we happy doing this lifestyle? is “Sh*t Yeah!” Every. Single. Time!
Pivot #2: even though we had a plan for our new path, we became aware of an even better option.
Letting Go of the Old Story/Stories ~ Decluttering
Lockdown in Melbourne, due to the Global Pandemic gave us a lot of time to think about what we wanted, going forward. It also almost single-handedly crafted a new version of each of us. After being used to working 5 days a week in the office, David learned how debilitating it is to have the same view (the back fence) out of the same window for days on end. We, as a family of three, at the time, discovered that dinner conversation needs external experiences to make things interesting and being able to only comment on the daily COVID press conference was not enough.
While I wouldn’t necessarily say that that period was pivotal in my journey, it was in David’s. A lot of really good things happened during that period for us, in a practical way; at the same time, a lot of assumptions about Life were challenged and reconfigured.
Knowing that we would soon be living in a family home of 2 (rather than 5) we began the process of getting rid of all the things that we didn’t think we’d need in our new home.
Again, I was, and am, happy to literally get rid of almost everything all at once. David is a lot more cautious! I cleared out a lot of stuff that I didn’t need, and we had a ‘dumping room’ where we put things we couldn’t quite get clear about needing or not needing.
In the end, we threw most of our belongings into a skip (dumpster), donated a few things, and stored the rest … on the assumption we’d need them when we moved into our rental property.
I was intrigued at how clear it was, to Me, that this was the Ending of a Story. I didn’t want to take most of our belongings with us. It felt very obvious that a New Story needed New Belongings. Most of the things in our family home were old, very loved and used. Old house, old energy. New house, new energy.
We cleared out the house of almost 30 years leaving only what would fit into two storage boxes (Taxibox) and our car. The storage boxes were partly for archiving ~ those ‘things’ that you will never throw away but probably never use, again; the things your descendants will have to deal with ~ and partly for future use. The car was filled to capacity with all the things we thought we’d need, immediately.
We moved into our first AirBnb, in a local area so we could commute back to the ‘family home’, just for a couple of weeks. Emptying the house made cleaning it so much easier for our dear friend, BJ, and a lot less stressful on me!
“Gypsy” Life ~ The “Taster” of What’s Possible (aka Try Before You “Buy”)
Can you imagine the FREEDOM that comes with being able to live like you’re on vacation, all the time? Our Pivot #2 insight was that we could live anywhere, rather than in just one place ~ an improvement, or upgrade, to our first plan of downsizing and moving closer to David’s workplace.
After putting the house on the market, we embarked on what we affectionately termed our “Gypsy Life”. We chose a bunch of different locations to live in and explore, making the most of our “work from home” time and knowing that, at some point, we’d need to be back in Melbourne for David’s return to the office.
Decision #1: which area/town do we want to live in?
We could choose anywhere in the State and even go out of State as long as we could get back ‘home’ if the borders closed (a reality that Victoria was still experiencing during COVID). So, we went to the ‘far extremes’: south to the coast, east to the southern-most part of the next State (NSW), and west to the other end of Victoria.
Decision #2: what kind of ‘home’/housing do we want to live in?
We had a vacation home that was huge and across the way from the beach; a selection of ‘family homes’, old and new; a unit in a big country town; a NYC loft style studio in Melbourne City; and even indulged in a ‘posh’ hotel stay for a few days (celebrating our anniversary).
And, it was while we were doing this lifestyle that we realised we could continue doing the same thing, even when David went back to the office.
We asked ourselves the same questions: where do we want to live and what kind of home do we want to live in. The “Walk to Work” period involved moving house every 4 weeks, from one suburb to the next. We lived in all the places we couldn’t afford to live in, in our family life period, and focused on David walking to work while continuing to declutter ~ this time, the car!
Our final Vision piece was to live overseas so we embarked on that part of the journey just less than 12 months after moving out of the family home … with a suitcase and a backpack, each.
Two years into this lifestyle and we are a lot more experienced, a lot more confident with our choices, and a lot more aware of what we really need in order to be living our best lives. As I think about this journey, I am aware of just how much of Me feels settled, like I’ve found my ‘home’. It’s taken a LOT of adjustment, a lot of challenging of belief systems, a lot of digging deeply into who I am … each day is a JOY, even when things are tricky or hard, because this path is the best option for this current version of Me. I am grateful.
Michelle xx
Want to know the nitty gritty stuff ~ like money management, relationship flow, dealing with anxiety? I’ll be sharing all that in the Next Edition: arriving in inboxes on December 11.
I loved reading your story, very inspiring xx
I love that you let us follow your journey. And to see how you’ve grown into the groove and ease of the nomadic life.