All About Me…

Hi! I’m a retired, divorced, mother of two, grandmother to four boys ages 16-10 and great-grandmother to four beautiful dogs. I am one of five siblings and grew up in South Dakota, a truly beautiful state! I was an elementary teacher that ended up in Higher Education for 33 years before retiring. An interesting fact is that while I’ve lived in four states, I moved eight times (different cities and states) in one year.

In September of 2020 I finally made the decision that I was going to sell my house, buy an RV and travel the US full time. There were several things that went into this decision, and it wasn’t a spur of the moment one. Let me see if I can explain.

My sister and brother-in-law retired and traveled around the US in their 5th wheel. He talked about how much he loved it. It gave me the bug and I started researching but I didn't want to go alone. Several friends said they’d love to go, and it sounded like fun. Two years later nothing had really been done. I think I was afraid to make that step, the commitment.

My best friend was a sister to me. Her family became my family and we traveled to many places together until she passed away from cancer a few years ago. In May 2020 my mom passed away then in September 2020 my brother-in-law passed away. That was the wakeup call that was needed. If I was going to do this, I needed to just do it and be ok with going on my own. 

My son and daughter have been supportive along the way, although I know I must give them major stress many times over. They have tracers on my phones, and they hear from me every day at least twice unless I’m staying with family or friends.

I will go into more detail regarding the process and what I went through in selecting a RV in my blog. My plan is to have the blog be informative but fun. I will include lots of photos as I love taking pictures and see that as a way of documenting my journey.

My son’s family loves playing board games and one is “Trekking the National Parks.” As we would play, I realized how few of the parks I have been to or have even heard of! A plan started forming and I am now going to visit all of the National Parks on my RV trip. It has given me a purpose (one of them.) This journey is going to be about the National Parks and monuments but also learning about myself, my family history, reconnecting with old friends and making new ones.

How about it, will you be along for the ride?

The purpose of life, after all, is to live it, to taste experience to the utmost, to reach out eagerly and without fear for newer and richer experience. — Eleanor Roosevelt