For the past three years my heart has felt lost, displaced and restless.

It is not because I’m not happy. During the last three years I also met and married my husband, a man who balances out my crazy, supports my dreams and compliments my motivation and drive for our future. Never have I been more sure about a decision than I was when I said yes.

We have a bright and joyful future ahead of us. It is one that plays out inside a vintage Westfalia camper van. It bumps and glides over long stretches of golden highway curling between climbing destinations. It houses conversations about what to eat for dinner, if our dog and cat are adjusting well to van life and whether or not we should take a rest day to go wine tasting (yes!).

Where we live now is considered a paradise destination to most. It is a place of blue skies and sandy beaches, turquoise waters and tropical temperatures. We are not beach people. We do not feel at home here.

Living here is not horrible, instead it is just a nagging sort of unsettling feeling. It feels like trying to wear a sweater two sizes too small. It’s uncomfortable and impossible to truly relax in. It’s itchy around the neck and restricts movement. It forces mobility and ease to be compromised against our will.

We have been talking about and saving for the future for a long time. We want to travel, we want to climb and we want to be together.

We have a plan.

There are many steps in this process. Some we have taken and some we have not. Some we have not yet thought about or even seen coming. Some will involve living on a glacier in Alaska for the summer, learning the technical skills required for future big mountain expeditions via our van life.

Some of these skills require me to learn how to correctly pump someones heart back into existence, and in doing so I’ll learn how to pump some life back into ours.

I will be celebrating this Valentine’s Day by taking the first step in a long line of many to make our future one where we can choose where we live and what we are surrounded by. It will be the first step in taking control of our circumstances and embracing the unique freedom that comes from combining the open road with knowledge and inspiration.

This Valentine’s Day I will be celebrating (appropriately) with a CPR class.

This class will allow me to work this summer, to gain the skills I need and open the doors my husband and I have been talking about for the last three years. This class about the heart, has turned out to be the key to finding mine.

Relephant: 

This is the easiest thing you can do to help save lives.

Author: Brenna Fischer

Editor: Renée Picard

Photo: OUCHcharley at Flickr