Five Years Hence

Happy First Day of Autumn! I love this season for the crispness in the air and that crackling anticipation of a new beginning. I get so excited to buy fresh blank notebooks and begin new projects. My birthday is in autumn, so it is also a natural time for me to spend a bit of time in self-contemplation to think about where I am along this life path and where I want to go next.

As much as I love to make lists, I've never really been a big long-term thinker. I'm more a short-term planner, as in what cultural events are on this month, what recipes should I try this week, what books are on deck...that kind of thing.

I gave this book 5: Where Will You Be Five Years From Today? to my husband a while back thinking it would inspire us to fill in our goals together. It has since sat on my shelf whispering reproachfully to me. While I have read the great motivational quotes within, we have yet to do the fill-in-our-goals part. However, going through some papers, I came across a list of things I wanted to do in life - dated exactly five years ago in 2009. I was astonished and pleased to see that here, five years later, I can check off many of the items. Five years has a way of seeming like a very long time and a very short time simultaneously. But during this particular chunk, from age 35-40 a lot of big stuff has happened:

• Worked for Starquest Expeditions - traveled to Peru, China, Samoa, Australia
• Traveled to Oaxaca for six weeks to study Spanish
• Moved to Argentina for six months but ended up on an icebreaker sailing to Antarctica with One Ocean Expeditions which I continued for three seasons.
• Got engaged
• Traveled to Guadeloupe
• Eloped to the courthouse on New Year's Eve
• Moved to Canada
• Got married again (to the same man) with family and friends in attendance in Vancouver
• Honeymooned in Vietnam
• Worked for Outstanding in the Field as the "Director of International Events"
• Got pregnant
• Had a miscarriage
• Got pregnant again a month later
• Pulled off a European Farm Dinner Tour for Outstanding in the Field - six dinners, six countries, three weeks.
• Spent a month in Italy with Christian
• Got laid off along with the rest of the company and scrambled to find a job whilst three months pregnant
• Watched in awe as my body grew a human
• Gave birth to my son
• Took full advantage of Canada's very civilized year-long maternity leave policy 
• Bought a house in Seattle and moved back to the United States
• Started this blog
• Traveled to Turkey, France, Hawaii, England, Gulf Islands
• Got pregnant
• Watched in awe as my body grew another human

     and in a few short weeks I am about to....

• Give birth to my daughter
• Turn 40 (How is that possible? I didn't think I would mind when it loomed far-off in the future. Now that is is suddenly upon me, I do rather mind.)

But looking back over the list, I realize I have well-earned 40 - not that I'm quite there yet - and I have packed quite a bit into these past five years. Perhaps writing that list helped plant some seeds which grow to fruition. That is the whole point of taking the time to physically write down your goals, according to the experts. What adventures await in the next five years? Time to write my Five Years Hence Plan.  Let's steer this ship.