“A smooth sea never made a skilled sailor.” – Franklin Roosevelt
As I thought about this post (which was originally titled “Life is a Roller Coaster and we’re taking the coasting part seriously”) it occurred to me – we often think of sailors having problems on the ocean in hugely tumultuous storms, but we often don’t talk about the doldrums. A part of the world near the equator where a sailing ship can get stuck for weeks without wind.
Nowadays that may not be quite as dramatic a problem, but imagine ships of the past, with human and other cargo, stuck in the hot, tropical air using supplies daily with no way to escape until their fortunes turned?
The same is true for relationships. We often talk about how to weather the storms, that bad times will come and you have to face it head on and overcome together, but we rarely talk about the silent killer of relationships – the doldrums. That time where life is just ticking over, day in and day out. For many that’s work, kids, extra-curricular activities, grocery shopping, etc., then just wash, rinse, repeat for 18-25 years.
For us that can be the same. Wake up, walk the dog, see the thing, write the post, teach the class, watch the TV, move one day a week and repeat endlessly.
We started to really experience that in the latter part of 2019. Stephen’s newest website, GC Galore, really required a lot of time, so he was spending just about every free minute working on it. I was prepping to take a vacation at the end of the year, teaching classes, trying to create new classes and getting into the rhythm of VIPKid teaching. We were like ships passing in the night, in the doldrums, slowly, aimlessly. Both the adventure of the trip and our relationship were taking a hit.
We’ve finally gotten a bit of a routine, but that’s not always a good thing. We stopped prioritizing talking to each other every day. We were both so focused on our tasks that we didn’t share much. We played a lot of Lemmings and Design Home on our phones. Stephen went to bed at 3am and I got up at 5am. We’d nap half the afternoon away each day. And, as with all long-term relationships, there’s an element of physical closeness (not just proximity) that’s required to stay connected that was missing – but I’ll leave that there for our parents who also read this blog. Don’t get me wrong, we weren’t arguing or on the verge of divorce or quitting the trip, we were just… floating along.
It’s going to be a long 3 years, and more after that if we aren’t always aware and alert to the other side of sailing through life together. We can’t afford to stay in the doldrums. We have to recognize them before we’re 3-4 months into them as we were at the end of 2019. Traveling together can be so fun, but not when we’re just being roommates that share a car, hotel room and pet care responsibilities. Marriage isn’t about making it through, it’s about making it as good as you can so that when you’re 60, 70 or 80, you look to your left and know who’s sitting next to you.
This is year 3. Thankfully we’ve planned exciting things, but we still have as much time to go as we’ve already spent on the road. As you’ve seen previously on these posts, every day isn’t beach fun and llama treks. We’ve already begun to make some minor changes to our work schedules to pay attention to any doldrums that may come into effect. We have A LOT of time planned in the car this year compared to previous years as we’re driving to Alaska and back. Stephen now knows that GC Galore will need a lot more time later in the year than he’d anticipated due to all the gift card deals that come out from October to December. I need to recognize sooner when the “holiday blues” are hitting – twice now October and November have been bad mental health months for me, so I’m much less inclined to go out and explore whereever we are.
So watch this space. Feel free to check-in with us in the Inner Circle to make sure we’re posting beyond the blog posts. If you see too many hotel reviews in a row with only grouped activity posts, we might be nearing a flat calm and maybe it’ll be time to suggest a challenge or activity for us to try to keep the road trip exciting. Not only for us but for you – the reader.
The first year was about Surviving.
This year is about Jiving. Getting along, sharing an accord and being close both in physical proximity (not hard since we’re always about 2-4 feet from each other) and more importantly, emotionally.
It’s very sweet that you recognize this and want to address it. I thought your trip was all fun and games (doing “the things” as you put it) but you still have to deal with daily life, relationship issues, etc. Best of luck to you Jiving in 2020!