It was a date in 2012. It was an ordinary day. It was probably a Saturday and sometime in the summer because Josephine, my daughter, had a friend over to spend the night. I had my best friend, Tasha, drop by for some movie and pool time at the house. There was definitely wine involved. All my best ideas come from grapes.
It was a simple family conversation. Tasha, DJ, and I were going to embark on a nearly 3 week trip to Italy in October 2012. It was the longest vacation we had ever taken and it would commence with Venice. The city of canals and riding in a gondola were a bucket-list item that Tasha wanted to cross off, and we were going to do it! Josephine and her friend asked what was a “bucket-list”. Excitedly and shocked, we explained this coveted tally as goals that one wanted to reach before one died. To put it into practice, I took out five sheets of paper and asked everyone to itemize the top 10 “things” each of us wanted to do before we exited this world. And, then, we would compare these agendas.
At the young age of 7, Josephine and her friend both wrote down an all expense paid shopping trip to Target (they are not wrong). Josephine also put all-you-can-eat Chick-fil-A as #8, right next to exploring the Titanic remains in a submarine as #9. Front row seats to a Pit Bull concert made the docket. Surprisingly, four of us had Paris on the lineup. Many other European cities/experiences made the ballot. Josephine then asked us, “When do we start?” It was so simplistic but incredibly deep. Here was a child with a desire to tick off her agenda right after her slumber party ended. And, this provoked another conversation as DJ’s wheels started churning.
At our current rate of vacation to Europe every three years, DJ calculated we would be nearly 90 years old in order to complete our bucket-lists. And that’s if we lived that long, able-bodied enough, and could still pay for these trips. There was a distinct possibility that we would not complete our goals. After consuming several bottles of wine, our joyous moment of dreaming and fantasizing suddenly became a stark reality and overwhelmingly disappointing. Our lives had an expiration date and they would not be fulfilled with the 50 elements on paper we just scribbled down. The only way we could cross off European experiences was to actually move across the Atlantic. We had visited Barcelona back in 2008 and we loved it.
And the solution was sparked. It was lit. It caught flame.
Could we sell it all and move to Spain?
DJ raised an eyebrow. I shrugged in a precarious way that indicated, “Why not?” What was stopping us?
We were currently working our asses off. I was in real estate and rode the foreclosure wave of 2008 for several years. I was exhausted from working 80+ hours per week, and my business was slowly declining as the economy recovered. DJ’s luxury business of home technology was taking off by leaps and bounds. With good sales, recurring income, and staff, his business could be a profitable asset worthy of sale. We were spending every penny on our bills, and we were living to work. It was a nice life in a beautiful home, but how much further did we need go to achieve The American Dream? By all accounts, we were already there. Were the next 30 years meant to keep up this pace? Maintain? No. The US marketing in place would demand we consume more, purchase bigger, be fancier, achieve the next level. With each step up, we would need to work harder to afford more. We were already exhausted before we even reached 40 years of age.
DJ and I pondered and shuffled ideas. We settled on a 5 year plan. We would save and sell enough to move to Spain. We would take a hiatus from working, an early retirement of sorts. We wanted to enjoy our good years while we still had mobility and health. We would be present for Josephine in her teenage years. We were going to actually do this. We were going to cross off so many bucket-list items! And a different American Dream came into focus: becoming an expatriate. How oxymoronic.
In the years following our decision to relocate to Spain, we became increasingly focused on our goal; which had realigned to early retirement as soon as possible. Our work became a heavy ball and chain around our legs. Clients became thorns. Friends started to lose touch because we were not falling in line. Family was questioning our sanity and our parental abilities. Our goal seemed to be delusions of grandeur to most. I became anxious thinking of cutting off everything I knew to be safe and moving to another country, culture, and language. In year 4 of our plan, over another bottle or two of wine, I suggested to DJ that we spend some time exploring the US before we moved to Spain. The original bucket-list did include some US travel and adventure, and, while we applied for our visas to Spain, we could take some time to traverse the amber waves of grains. DJ agreed.
The preliminary plan was to rent an RV and go across the US in a loop from the east to the west coast and back. After researching rental plans, I found that renting for 3 months was nearly the same price as buying an RV, which took me down another path and another bottle of wine. After presenting the idea of an RV purchase, DJ thought we could take more time traveling America. Since we were taking a break from work, what was the rush to get to Spain? With my anxiety, maybe an extended stay in the homeland would help ease the transition.
And, then, a whirlwind of events occurred nearly simultaneously in late Spring of 2016, still just 4 years into our plan.
DJ was breaking his back with work. 14 hour work days, unmanageable staff, and never satisfied clients had taken its toll. But, DJ had secured a buyer for the business. A contract was created and the purchase was set in motion.
I researched and found the perfect RV floor plan. A unit went on sale in Ohio. DJ and Josephine flew to Columbus to purchase the RV and drive it back home to Atlanta. We then became owners of the infamous FunSeeker.
I put our house on the market and began the months’ long process of selling nearly every item we owned. We contracted quickly on the house. DJ’s business was sold. The house finally closed. I gave termination notice at the brokerage office. All that simply (it wasn’t simple or easy or without stress and anxiety or with a clear detailed blueprint) summed up to a day in late October 2016 when our wine-induced scheme to move to Spain rolled into true action like a tumbleweed, but with a small detour to travel the US first.
Up next is the introduction of the FunSeeker, which requires an entirely new blog post. It is the opposite of Undoing the American Dream. It is the ultimate: living full time in an RV, wandering the States of America for 18 months before diving off the deep end.
Loosely Lucy 