Author: Lauren Mirs

My first grade teacher handed out award certificates when he saw behavior in the classroom worth encouraging. I got an award ‘because you enjoyed yourself!’ It’s hard to imagine that this happened so rarely that he felt the need to reward me for it, but apparently that may have been the case.

In the same vein, you may have noticed that there was no mention of ‘fun’ as one of the reasons for my taking this trip.  

I’m sure people mean well with parting words of ‘Have fun!’ If the tables were turned and someone else were travelling, I would probably say the same thing. But I think fun is more appropriate as a by-product than a goal. My internal reaction to the question “Are you having fun?” is, Who cares?  

It reminds me of people saying that when they grow up, they want to be happy. As charming as that sounds, it’s unrelatable. When hearing this, I would think, It was never the job of a writer to be happy. My job is to be present.  

“Fun” is not the word I would use to describe climbing a 100-foot-tall fire tower, standing outside in 20-degree weather waiting for sunrise, looking into the chilling eye of an alligator, or visiting the Holocaust Museum. However, that doesn’t mean those activities weren’t worthwhile.  

“Safe travels” seems to be the preferred goodbye between travellers; it allows for complexity in the experience. For variety, we need more phrases that convey, “I hope you don’t die, but if you do, I hope it’s while you’re doing something amazing.” 

People have asked about the motivation for my road trip, the purpose, and whether it’s everything I thought it would be. I didn’t know what to expect; there were so many unknowns.

As far as the purpose, on one hand, the only reason I took to the road was to do something that I had a desire to do.  

On the other hand, there are lots of reasons for a cross-country road trip: to change, for adventure, to explore, to see what’s out there (and what isn’t, but should be), to expose myself to different lifestyle and viewpoints, to expand my worldview, to learn, to try new things, to challenge myself, to grow, to live more fully, to follow my intuition, to open myself to opportunity, to live more spontaneously, and to create a pivot point, to take a chance.  

I bet that after this, after seeing the results of taking this one chance, I will be more inclined to take other chances.

Am I getting out of the trip what I hoped to get out of it? It’s more a matter of whether I’m putting in what I hoped to put in. I’m getting better.  

I’d asked myself what I’d do with one year left to live, but I should have also asked what I’d do with 70 more years to live. Not everything can be accomplished in one year. Learning to play the violin at the level of the Boston Philharmonic probably takes some time.

I wish I had started earlier. I should have chosen goals with varying timelines and worked toward them simultaneously.   

It’s become a new game. Subtract your age from a hundred (or, if you’re really ambitious, 120). Think of the social movements you could lead or be involved in, the skills you could master, the experiences you could have, the ideas you could come up with, the wisdom you could gain and pass along in that amount of time. It’s amazing.  

I’ve wasted the last twenty-five years. I can’t go back in time, but I can make sure I don’t waste the next twenty-five.