There is a certain excitement one gets when going on a road trip that you don’t get when flying.  Yes, you dread sitting in the car all day, but you can listen to music all day and eat snacks that you don’t normally eat and your journey often has several destinations.

Living on an island, you either have to be able to keep up that excitement or it might die out while doing all of the things you have to do to get ready for the road trip.  First, we have to load all of our stuff in the boat and put it in bags that won’t get wet in case it rains on the boat ride over to the mainland.  Then, we have to get all the stuff out of the boat and into the car.  We also have to pull the boat out of the water because we don’t want to leave a boat in the water for two weeks during hurricane season.  Finally, we have to park our boat somewhere safe.  I won’t even get into traveling with small children and babies.  So while most people get up, grab a coffee and get on the road, we get up at 6:30 and we are on the road by 11:30.

While we do go to the mainland all the time for groceries, we have not left Florida since we got here in September 2017.  Traveling up the interstate was made me realize how much can change in just 9 months.

Dictionary.com defines culture shock as a state of bewilderment and distress experienced by an individual who is suddenly exposed to a new, strange, or foreign social and cultural environment.  While I have spent a lot of time in big cities, I quickly got used to my quiet island life and found myself out of my comfort zone several times along our trip.  First, there was the really confusing road signs and I had completely forgotten about road tolls.  Walking into a crowded rest area, I opened the restroom door a little too fast and was startled to see people standing in line.  That was an inconvenience I hadn’t experienced in a while.  And what on earth is Eat Clean Bro?

While visiting my mother, I never noticed how loud the highway noise was.  You can’t even open your windows at night because it’s so loud.  I felt very spoiled when I got aggravated that I had to drive around looking for parking.

Even the positive things were disorienting.  I didn’t know what to do with the lighting fast internet.  I had gotten used to multi-tasking while waiting for my pages to load.  When was I supposed to go get my coffee?  I also found myself wondering where all the bugs were.  I definitely did not miss them though.  I was irrationally distrustful of the tap water at my mother’s house.  You mean you just drink it right out of the tap without filtering it or anything?  I of course miss my family and wish I could see them more often, but modern conveniences make me lazy.

Getting out of your comfort zone is good for you and in this case, it made me appreciate my island life even more.  I was craving my daily walks on the beach and my more active life. My husband and I keep saying that hauling all this stuff into and out of the boat and up to the house is going to keep us in shape and I’m sure he’s right.  I’m so much less wasteful because it takes so much time and energy to get things to and from our house.  I really try not to throw anything out and repurpose things when possible.

I like that I’ve learned to improvise when I run out of things since I can’t just run to the store.  There is something satisfying about scrounging around your kitchen and coming up with something really good to eat.  It usually turns out pretty good and then you have a new meal to work into the rotation.  Almost everything in life has its tradeoffs.

I’ll go without the fast internet, and the meal delivery service and I’ll take the stinky water and even the bugs.  I will haul water to and from the boat and into the house if I can live where I can take my kids to the beach before dinner and watch them jump around in the surf and take outdoor showers with shower beers.  On a site note, there is an entire site dedicated to shower beer selfies.  I think the outdoor shower beer has one up on them.  Nature is beautiful and it is also dangerous, but you would lose out on so many wonderful experiences if you lived your life in fear.

This is my new happy hour.