There Should be More to Normal than Escape

In 2019 I was away from home about 5 full months throughout the year. At the time we thought of it as our “normal” that we travelled so much while living a lifestyle I can barely recognize today. For that matter, if you had told me in 2009 that in 2019 my life would look like it did I probably would’ve told you you were crazy too. Somehow we had come to define our normal life as where we were in the moment rather that anything that would have resembled normal before or since. It wasn’t sustainable.

As I write this we have traveled very little going back to the end of 2019, a few trips for a wedding, a holiday trip and a weekend we took last June for my birthday are it. As I listen to friends scream about “returning to normal” I’ve come to realize that I’ve found a new normal and I’m fine with it.

The idea of “normal” as simply the time before COVID now seems so strange to me. So many I knew lived on takeout and beer while jumping from city to city on the weekends in search of what I can best describe, looking back today on the conversations of the time, as escape.

If escaping your life is normal than count me out.

Don’t get me wrong, I have things I want to change, first among them is where I live. We bought this house in pursuit of the 2019 normal and now I see just how sick that really was.

Today we’re searching for a place to call home which won’t require constant escapes. Sure, travel is great, but if travel is required something is wrong. I no longer want that kind of wrong in my life.