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So About That Road Trip… (and a peak at my 2023 Resolutions)

bethanycuenod

It's funny how the best laid plans go awry.


Where Was I

I started this blog at the beginning of the summer in 2022 all about how to work remotely. I was really looking forward to a slow-ish season at work and enjoying the last summer before my son started school. I was going to take the time to write out all of my road trip tips and tricks, talk about how to work remotely, talk about my casual road trips that I took time off, but life had other plans for me.


On the Monday of what would have been my third post, I was planning on writing the remainder of that post, but someone ran a red light and t-boned me and another car at an intersection close to my house. My car was totaled and plans for writing were pretty much shattered for the foreseeable future. For a variety of reasons, I can't talk about the accident, but I hope that I can talk about it in more detail in the future.


In any case, it wasn't until I was driving back home from my most recent cross country trip (i.e. yesterday on the drive home) that I realized I wanted to get back to writing about driving again. There's so much that I want to share and even new experiences and suggestions I have to offer as a result of this most recent voyage (plus oodles of amazing photos I haven't had the chance to share).


I appreciate your patience in waiting for these posts to resume and I am also very grateful for all of you who have reached out and asked questions about my trips. It means a lot. I look forward to sharing these experiences with you.


What Now

That saying, I don't want to make your trip to another browser window too short and make it worth your while, so let me tell you a bit about my goals for this past year and my goals for the upcoming one. Please feel free to navigate back to your previous window if you're just interested in specifically road trip bits of my blog.


Despite me trying to reduce my social media use, I have found that having publicly stated my yearly resolutions has helped me hold myself accountable to the things I want to do for this year. So while I may not be posting this on Instagram, I still need to make it public so I'm posting it here (and may be adding a link to LinkedIn for more public accountability 😅).


My resolutions for this past year (2022) were as follows:

  1. Buy a House - Achieved!

  2. Travel More - Specifically 2 new national parks and 5 new state parks - Achieved!

  3. Track Things - .... I'd give this a 7/10


Buy a House

Remarkably, I was about to buy a house right before the interest rates skyrocketed in March of this year. The whole reason I wanted to buy a house this year of all years was because my son was starting school and I wanted to ensure some stability for us. I thought the only way to do this was by having a permanent address that we owned, but now that I'm looking back on it, I really didn't need to own a home to make that happen. This was one of those life check marks I assumed that I needed to have. I don't regret the decision and I know it will be better in the long run, but I took on more than I really understood. Owning a home is so much work and this is partially my fault because the home wasn't new, but this type of living (and cost expenditure) has been such an adjustment. I'll talk about this more in future posts, but jeeezzz.


Travel More



I started road tripping in 2021 (as previously stated and probably the whole reason that you're here) and that urge to travel just became greater and I made it a resolution and I actually achieved it (mostly in the nick of time). I traveled a bunch up until my accident and then I kind of didn't go anywhere until I just got back from this most recent trip. The reason for my specifics when traveling (state and national parks) is because I have a five year bucket list goal to hike at least one trail at every Texas State Park and a ten year bucket list goal to do the same at every US National Park.


There are 88 Texas State Parks and 63 National Parks (ok so there are actually 423 National Parks, but I'm talking National Parks like Yellowstone and Grand Canyon National Parks). So far, I've hiked 31 Texas State Parks and 7 National Parks. Ok, to be fair, this year I snowmobiled instead of hiked a trail in Yellowstone, but I'm still counting it.


Track Things

I got better at this, but I'm still not where I'd like to be. Consistency has always been my downfall. For one reason or another, being able to do the same thing every single day is just a struggle. It's boring and I don't like it. It's part of the reason I always search for roles that allow me to have a little bit of everything all of the time. That being said, this gets a 7/10 because I've adopted several daily habits such as Duolingo, parce que je veux practiquer mon français, and adopting a skin care routine (thanks Reddit!).


What About This Year

I do try my best to be intentional about setting goals that are SMART (business school taught me lots that I've applied elsewhere in my life), and this year is no different. I want to be able to not stress myself out by setting goals that are unattainable.


As a result, the goals for this year are as follows:

*pause for drumroll*

  1. Be more judicious before engaging in things

  2. Be more purposeful with my time


Yeah. I know. After all of that talk of setting SMART goals, I hit you with some vauge things. Both of these are around the same sort of idea, but I have solid reasons behind setting them as such and there are several things that I've categorized under each, so thing of these as more goal *themes*.


For being more judicious before engaging in things, this is a bit of a call back to a New Year's resolution I had at the beginning of 2020 which was allowing myself to say no and to end things. This was mostly in regards to allowing myself to stop watching TV shows that I didn't like rather than pushing through, but lets just say I sprinkled that lesson through other things in my life. Regardless, as a result of that resolution, I've gotten good at stopping things I don't want to do.


What I'd like to do this year is be a little less impulsive about taking on new projects and crafts, or TV shows, books, etc, and just not get into them in the first place. I don't like having unfinished things and while I've gotten good at accepting that things end and sometimes aren't finished and that's ok, but I'd like to pivot a bit and see if I can get better before stopping those things before they start. I'd like to have less than 5 unfinished projects at the end of 2023.


As for being more purposeful with my time, this is a result of growing old (yes I know I'm not *old*). Since turning 30 (a whole year and a half ago), I've started to sense that whole time moves quicker. I know we're all experiencing a bit of time dilation and constriction with COVID and time doesn't really make sense, but as a result of all of this, I'd like to be a bit more intentional with my time. I'm not saying I want to pack my days with copious amounts of activities and not rest, but I'd like for my time to be done with intention. When I'm with my son, I want to make sure I have a goal for it, even if that goal is to do nothing. Knowing what you want to get out of a situation is just as important.


I'd also like to drink more water, find what shape I want to get into and get into it, start making all of my own clothes, and find a suitable gluten free recipe alternative for all my favorite gluten filled staples (cinnamon rolls and croissants 😭), so will take suggestions to help me get into all of those.


If you're still reading

Thanks. It got a little bit rant-y at the end, but I was about to start waxing poetic about psychology and mindsets and I thought better not. Regardless, look for more road trip stuff coming soon. Goal is a post a week which I don't think is unreasonable. They just may not all be as clever and witty, but building the habit of writing is really the goal.





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