Day 0

About 6 weeks ago, I quit my job on a sort of whim. I had been planning to quit for a while since it was becoming rather intolerable, but I hadn't planned the exact details of the resignation yet. As you may have construed, I was on the brink and didn't need much to send me over the edge. So, when my boss started to get snarky and rude, I opted to quit on the spot. I planned to work for 30 more days after the quit, as my contract had required, but my boss took great offence to hearing that I had applied to other jobs and effectively kicked me out. 

My instinct was to take a trip. Why not? I had no authority to request time off from anymore, so I was essentially free to do as I pleased. Vancouver was still as miserable as ever in the middle of February. The rain was relentless and the cold had not eased up. Additionally, I had saved up a bit of money from working this job for two years. It made sense to take a trip somewhere warm. 

I asked my roommate if he wanted to come and he was potentially interested. He took a look online at flights and found a steal -- 337$ roundtrip to a place in Mexico called Huatulco. Neither of us had ever heard of it, but, after checking out a map, we saw it was in the State of Oaxaca -- a place we had heard of. We mulled a travel strategy for the trip. We'd fly into Huatulco, on the water, have a week of lazy beach days, and then grab a bus to the actual city of Oaxaca, which is inland, to see the culture and whatnot. The plan wasn't set in stone, but it seemed like a good idea overall. We decided to sleep on it for a bit, while my roommate simultaneously sorted out his finances to see if he could afford the trip.

Soon thereafter, my roommate offered I come to his hometown of Calgary with him. I figured the change of scenery would be good for me and it seemed like a relaxing escape. I would live in his childhood home and my meals would be prepared by his family; then, I would go skiing at his family's vacation home in Banff. I estimated the whole thing to cost me a little over $80, the cost of the roundtrip flight ticket there. Accommodation and food were covered, and I guess skiing would be an extra cost. 

I arrived and everything was exactly as I had expected it to be. Living with his parents was a nice experience since their lifestyles were compatible with mine. It was thoroughly relaxing and reviving. I caught up on sleep and felt supremely recharged. I even hit the slopes one day and had a good time. At some point, I mentioned to my roommate that this trip was going well, so we should consider booking the Huatulco one. He said to give him a day so that he could consult with his parents about the trip. We set dates and I booked my one-way ticket that night to lock in the price that same night.

This was a good play because the next morning, my indecisive roommate consulted with his parents, got ready to book and found that the ticket had gone up to 1500$. Needless to say, he was no longer coming. 

Now I had a one-way, albeit refundable, ticket to this place I never even heard of a mere two weeks prior. Two small issues were: 1. I didn't like the date I was leaving. It was a month from now, which didn't make sense because it meant that I would have to pay to live in Vancouver for an extra month. Jobless, I have no reason to be in that city. Additionally, the weather is a huge factor for me. The misery that is Vancouver in the winter (and that does include February, March and even April) is intolerable. I'd much rather escape that as soon as possible. 2. What if I get a job between then and now? I had applied to quite a few and essentially felt like I would have to accept an offer if it came in. I'd lose the non-refundable portion of 100$, but that would probably make sense in the grand scheme of things.  

Anyways, our two-week trip felt slow, but in a good way. Time had been moving far too quickly for me up until that point. I had this random one-way ticket booked and was trying to make a plan for what to do. By the time we were back in Vancouver, I had a mere two weeks to sort things out. I'd either have to commit to quitting my job search and going on a long trip through South America, or accept a job and go back to the 9-5 grind, or cancel both the job and the trip and plan something third altogether. 

I've been struggling to understand why I felt like I had to go on an extended trip. Why couldn't I have simply committed to a little two-week sunshine getaway, as had been my initial plan with my roommate? I have introspected enough to come to determine that it probably had something to do with this irrational fatalistic dread that looms over me. Since I began working full-time, I have felt like I had incredibly limited time. Therefore, time is precious. Therefore, make the most of it. 

When you work 9-5, you tend to be chronically exhausted, so even your time off isn't used for enjoyment -- it's used for sustenance. Sometimes that sustenance takes the form of cooking myself a meal, sometimes it takes the form of cleaning my kitchen, and sometimes it takes the form of sleeping 13 consecutive hours. Regardless, the time off that comes with a full time job is not for enrichment -- it's for survival. You have the minimum you need to physically survive and you are nefariously stifled from getting any time beyond the bare minimum. Your body ages, and your soul dwindles. I know this best because I couldn't open my computer to write a single piece whilst working. I simply didn't have the stamina. 

So I guess that is where my dread stems from. I can't envision having 2-3 months to travel while employed. I can't envision being in a position where I don't have to get that time approved by some bureaucratic assembly of mediocre people. I can't envision having the energy to see new places while employed. I can envision going to a beach resort and being brain dead for 2 weeks every Christmas while employed. But I can't envision feeding my soul while employed. 

And why not enrich my soul some other way? I don't know. I wonder if I could simply stay in Vancouver with my lovely sister and fantastic friends and achieve the same enlightenments. But everyone on social media promotes this as being the golden method for growth, so I guess I have to try it too. 

With this mindset, I decided that now was the time. I was going to call off the job search and commit to an idea I had only ever vaguely considered -- touring South America. At this point, I had about 3 weeks until I was flying to Huatulco, which I figured was enough time to get everything in order in Vancouver and plan a big trip. I was going to see how I could hop through the continent and reawaken my soul that had been tamped by the vicious grip of the 9-5 life. 

So what did I do? Look at Chile. Why Chile? The country's shape has always intrigued me and it's been said that you can experience a lot of different things depending on where you go. So I found a 400$ one-way from Santiago to Vancouver for June 1st and I booked it. I took the next 3 days to devise a plan for the in between. 

In the meantime, I subletted my room and got my paperwork in order. 

I had now committed over 600$ to a 10-week trip I had not really thought about. If my boss hadn't rejected my 30-day resignation thing, I'd still be working the last bit of my contract, but here I was.

The reality of everything only hit me when I started to pack up my room for my subletter. That was also when the panic set in. Things were going well for me in Vancouver; I had some great relationships going. I could have easily stayed and played board games and applied to jobs and gone on a few tiny trips with my friends. I do not know why I am doing this alone. It is riddled with risks. I am a lone, non-intimidating woman in a series of foreign countries I know very little about. I have one backpack packed. I am in tears because something tells me this is a mistake. My life will not end with the beginning of a new job, but now I'm committed and invested. And also, take-off is in 12 hours.