Vacation - had to get away
I have a feeling this post is going to be quite the journey (no pun intended) so let’s dive right in.
This past weekend, I went on the first vacation of my entire life where every single thing was decided by me. Now, this may not sound like a big deal, but hear me out. I’ve traveled quite a bit in my life. From a very young age, I was going to Florida almost every year to see my grandmother. When my dad moved to England, I would go visit him for a week every summer and we traveled around. Traveling and vacations are not a new thing for me. I’ve always loved to travel and the fact that I hadn’t been on a true vacation in nearly 7 years was really taking its toll on me.
When I was with my ex we still traveled. Lots of road trips, but there were a few get-in-a-plane vacations as well. And while I was in charge of booking flights and hotels, he decided everything else: where we went, what we did, what we drank… etc. If I did propose an idea, it was usually met with hostility. There were hardly any trips where we didn’t get into a fight at some point in time (not to push my book here, but most of these stories are in there). I loved getting away, but every vacation was met with aggravation, frustration, and often tears.
In 2018, after I left him, a unique opportunity presented itself when I heard about a music festival happening in New Jersey. I was still living in Massachusetts at the time so this would be my first time away by myself and while I did get to make all of my own decisions that weekend, the whole time was spent at the music festival so there really wasn’t much to decide. Since moving to New York, all of my vacations have been to go “home” back to Massachusetts and stay with my dad for a few days. Yes, it’s still time away, but it never feels like a vacation… it feels like going home.
Last fall I had the idea to take a trip out to California. My reasoning behind the vacation was not the best (plus I really couldn’t afford it), so I ended up canceling. When the tour cities were announced for Freestyle Love Supreme and I saw that they were ending their tour in the same part of California I had originally been planning to go to, I was excited, but I had told a friend of mine to not, under any circumstances, let me buy tickets. I knew I wouldn’t be able to afford the trip and I was trying really hard to make better financial decisions. But if you’ve known me long enough you’ll know that when it comes to FLS I don’t always make the most rational decisions. I told her to get me a couple tickets for the final day only and I’d figure out the hotel and flight at a later date.
The anticipation mounted as the first week in August drew closer and closer. I knew I was going to have a lot of emotions going into this vacation (for a number of reasons), but it wasn’t until I got to JFK on the morning of my flight out that I realized what it was…
This was my first vacation where everything is 100% decided by me.
There is no bigger source of freedom than that. I know people who travel solo all the time and it’s always so great to see their experiences, but when you’ve been living life behind someone else’s wants and needs and then finally get the chance to do it all on your own… there’s no greater feeling. I got to decide what I did, didn’t do, what I ate, whether I wanted to drink or not, who I saw and when. It was all my choice. It was almost as if the last 4 years led up to this exact trip… and it was perfect.
I found that by Sunday night I had a sort of calm to my demeanor… a zen, if you will. I wasn’t allowing petty things to bother me. I was simply existing in the moment and allowing myself to just… be (granted this was before my flight got canceled and I had a mild panic attack outside the theatre, but I digress). There are a number of factors as to why I was feeling the way that I was, but none of them are important. The takeaway from all of this was that after so much time spent worrying about things out of my control and letting my emotions be dictated by outside factors, I was able to truly let go and allow myself to just exist. It may have only been a few days, but a few days can mean so much.
Before I close this out, there’s one other thing I want to talk about. I was going to write another post but it feels within the same realm so let’s just do.
Vulnerability.
Those that have been following me for a while know that I am a member of the FLSA community. It feels like a lifetime since I did my classes, but FLSA allowed me to truly find myself and be vulnerable which are both really hard things to accomplish. The reason this all matters is that I find when I’m around large groups of FLSA members, even those I’ve never met in person before, I never have to worry about them seeing me. I don’t have to mask or try to be someone I’m not because these people have already seen me at my best and worst times.
In my every day life I often have to keep myself very guarded. I don’t fully “fit in” with the people I work with so I never feel like I can be my most authentic self. I have to dress a certain way and act a certain way in order to be accepted. For someone that spent most of her life not really even knowing who she was, that’s a hard thing to fall back into day after day. I’ve found that during my non-work hours, I’ve been adjusting the way I dress to more suit the person that I am now. When I was on vacation I was able to be that person - the person that I’ve grown to actually like - and I never had to worry about whether the people I had planned to see would accept this person or not because they already know and like her.
To make a long story short (too late), this vacation was more than just time away. It gave me the opportunity to be my real, true, authentic self without fear of rejection.
That in and of itself, without any other factors, made the entire trip (canceled flight aggravation and all) completely worth it.
- Danielle
