The Trip That Didn’t Happen

This is a travel blog and so it seems weird to share about the trip that didn’t happen. 

All the same, I think it’s time to talk about it.  Covid has taken so much from so many; including lives. I often feel stupid to feel sad about this, but I have come to understand that it is it’s own type of loss in a way, and it’s had a big impact on me.

I value both vacations and travel but they are very different to me.  I view vacations as an escape and a recharge.  For me this often includes ease and preferably has a beach or at least a pool or lake.  Travel is an adventure.  For me, the whole point of travel is to take you just beyond your comfort zone (and sometimes further).  New sights, smells, tastes, and experiences.  Tests to your sense of judgment, sense of self, sense of community. Vacation is usually relaxing; travel is often exhausting.  Sometimes travel and vacation mix and we have often tried to do that, but I don’t travel to relax or escape, I travel to live.  Travel is part of who I am.  

I think that I was about twenty years old the first time I heard about the exchange program.  I was in University and couldn’t wait to talk to Jarett about it.  A full year exchange but basically still “working” for your school division.  A chance to live and work and experience life somewhere far away and have it worked into your life back here. Also, an incredible teaching opportunity to grow professioally.  Jarett and I immediately started dreaming about one day going to Australia.  The years went by and we were still young and the dream started to take more shape. 

 We made a plan (shocking if you know us lol).  We thought that once we had kids, we would want to wait until they could remember it, so mid elementary.  Well, we had those babies and the dream stayed strong.  January of grade 4 and 2 would be our first choice and it would leave us a back up of the next year with Lleyton getting home to finish off grade six.  After that we thought it might be too hard to take the kids away when they are in junior high.

Why did we want to go?  Well beyond beaches and the accents there were so many reasons.  We wanted to be in a situation where we were really working and living outside our comfort zone.  We wanted to explore and connect as a family and to rely on one another.  We wanted to experience things that would create memories and help us each grow personally and as a family. And the Australian Open.  A huge bucket list item for Jarett and I.  I mean, Lleyton’s name has inspiration from the Australian tennis legend, Lleyton Hewitt.  We would have gone to watch tennis upon arriving (early January before the first quarter) or after our year was done.  

The application process was intense but exciting!  And then…waiting.  The matching process goes through so many levels.  We got our match March 9th, 2020.  I remember because it is Lleyton’s birthday.  My principal and I looked at the awesome candidate and place, and then I went home to Jarett.  

We were over the moon excitedI  It was a picture perfect postcard city on the coast in a place people even in Australia travel to visit. The house was also beyond perfect.  The family that would stay in our house seemed amazing.  It was everything we had dreamed of and more.

We decided not to tell the kids until the next day, as it was Lleyton’s birthday.  The next night we poured that file folder out onto the kitchen table and we talked through everything.  In the end all four of us were a yes! A bit nervous/excited for the kids but the backyard pool and walking distance to the beach were definitely awesome! So March 11, 2020 we put in our official yes and then we just needed to wait for the Australia side to also accept.

And then the world fell apart.

March 16th we started online for the rest of the year.  In time, the exchange plans were paused then canceled for that year.  The program was paused for the next year too.  

This means that we would have/should have come and been back this past December/January (depending which Open we chose to see)  Even our plan B ship has sailed as we would be there now too.  

It is done. This particular version of this dream is done.  It has taken me so long to even say it, but it is true. 

It just won’t be the way we dreamed it would be for twenty years.  Can we do something sometime? Sure! Will it be what we planned for twenty years? No.  Is that ok?  Well….probably yes, and I guess that’s why I am able to write this now.  It was never gonna be a picnic (hence my whole travel vs. vacation preface)  and we can find a different thing in time. And that adventure will be worth it and possibly better.  For now though, I am finding this Australian Open on TV these nights particularly hard.  Should have been, could have been.  I will take the lessons I hoped for, that were given to me in a far different way: relying on the four of us, and finding a way though tricky circumstances.  I am grateful for the lessons still….but can’t help wish they had been learned on a beach 😉