Turkish Delights.

My sister was meant to visit my dad in the Caribbean, I was thinking about going with her. It would only be a couple of hundred pounds out of my savings account, my treat to myself for doing so well and saving so much.

There had been a storm where my dad was, which had put a large hole in the side of the schooner he works on, so the trip had to be cancelled, my mum explained to me. My sister was quite upset; she had been very excited about going to see my dad. She had always been “daddy’s-little-girl” and I understood how much the trip had meant to her. Mum suggested that we still go somewhere else and I agreed that I would take her on holiday.

One week in Turkey later and my savings were gone. I took my sister to Belek, a small town in the Antalya region on the Mediterranean coast; we even stayed in an all-inclusive hotel. We drank, danced and had a great time. I loved the Turkish people and, to me, it felt like I was making friends at every corner. I had never been abroad before so this was my first experience of hot weather and sandy beaches, and I loved it! I came back more determined than ever that I had to travel.

My depleted savings never seemed to get back to where they had been after that, even though I spent months spending nothing, it seemed. I was in a state of depression after being out of the UK, only to return to the rain. It felt like it had rained solidly for months since I returned with my sister from Turkey. I moved to Glasgow that November, 2006, one final attempt to get myself a job with better earnings. I set myself a goal, within the year I wanted to be in a job that paid me no less that £15,000 a year.

February 2007 and I was working in an office doing audio typing, I’d never done typing before but it was paying my bills. At £6 an hour it wasn’t quite paying me what I wanted so I was still looking for the ‘good salary’ I’d promised myself.

By the end of March I was depressed again. Rain. More Rain. The prediction of the weather was the same pretty much every day, or so it felt. Rain. Its Scotland I suppose, I knew it rained a lot when I moved back here. I still hadn’t gotten over my short holiday to Turkey the year before. I was pining to be somewhere sunny, even just dry, I’d settle for that. It all became too much one day and I ended up texting my best friend, Marianne, while on the Thomas Cook Website, scrolling through package deals.

“We’re going on holiday” I text her.

“Ok, where?” she replied.

 “Turkey, we’ll go for my birthday” I sent to her. It was agreed, just like that. When I saw her that night we talked over the finer details and I showed her what packages I had found and the next day I booked and paid for our week in Side, pronounced See-day, a small town not far from where I had stayed with my sister. The time felt like it dragged and, as we got closer to our holiday, both of us were panicking about our lack of spending money. It seemed like every time I got something saved I had to pay it out; bills, debts, it was never ending! By the time the holiday arrive both of us had barely any spending money between us. The prospects for our big fun, sunny holiday were as bleak as the raindrops outside my bedroom window.

We were in need of some kind of back up cash flow. There was no way we would be able to have a fantastic amazing time without the cash flow to pay for it; I knew that, as did Marianne. It must have shown because my mum lent us her credit card saying that we were to make sure we had a good time and not to worry about cash. We did have a good time, an amazing time actually, although it took us most of the week to pluck up the courage to use the credit card, which sat in my purse flashing green at me every time I opened  it to get cash out.  It was one of the best birthdays I had every had, even though we had very little money.

 I have found that when you are in need life has a way of providing for you. The generosity that we experienced was astounding, and for my birthday we paid for very little. I was surrounded my kind, friendly people when I turned 24 and I decided that I couldn’t imagine a better way to turn 25, but I would be in Australia by then, surely.

Why Travel?

This all started when I was about 20 really (I mean, I’ve wanted to go travelling since I was 16 but never thought I would till then). I was working 2 jobs, one in an off-license and one in a bar, trying to make ends meat. I wanted to do something with my life that was an adventure, fun! Working where I was certainly wasn’t doing that for me and my boyfriends business was failing, not that it was ever very successful in the first place.

One drunken night we were sitting with a good friend of ours, Tris. We were talking about what we wanted to do, where we saw ourselves in a couple of years, that normal casual drunken conversation. By the end of the night we had decided we were going to travel the world together, we even drew out our own version of a world map with all the destinations on it we had to go visit, starting with the red lands of Australia. My boyfriend’s business was a reptile pet shop, so Australia was the perfect place for us to explore a land filled with these amazing creatures. My own favorite little lizard was native to Australia, the Thorny Devil.

A plan was formulated. We discussed the finer points like timeline and money and savings. I spent many hours, days and weeks dreaming about the day we would all set off on our big adventure; my heart was set on it…

But it never came.

A whole year later and the business was no more. My Boyfriend eventually relented and closed it down, knowing it was costing more than it was making and neither of us could afford to fund it, as I was the only one working.  I was still working my two jobs, and we still had no savings, we had achieved nothing. It was frustrating. I was desperate to get out of the small town I was living in and try to make something more of myself, it was never going to happen in Loughborough, a small town in Leicestershire, England.

I managed to convince us both that the answer was to move to Glasgow, a big city and my home. There would be more jobs there, and more money. It was the only answer I could think of, since he was having no luck finding work anywhere in the area.

2 months after my 21^st birthday we packed up a van filled with everything we owned, even the reptiles, and set off on the long, very long, journey up to Scotland. Under normal circumstances it probably would not have been so long but the van we were in was old, probably definitely overloaded and cramped. The radio didn’t even work! It was our friend, Muzzy, that drove the 300 and something mile long journey up with us and then back down on his own. It makes me laugh now, but I can tell you at the time it wasn’t so funny. It was the most boring trip I have ever had to take! I felt bad for Muzzy having to do the same trip back; at least he might be able to go a bit faster with it empty.

Within a month or so both myself and my boyfriend were working, I was doing 2 jobs again (Off-license and bar) and he was working in a small smoky pub full of old locals. But he had changed. I no longer felt that this was a person I could travel with, or be with for much longer in my life. The relationship ended. He eventually moved out and got a place of his own and we carried on our lives, separately. Frustration swallowed my hopes to travel and although I would still always say ‘I’m going travelling next year’ I never truly felt that it was ever going to happen, but I kept promising myself it would, one day. All my hopes for my life depended on going travelling now, I had no idea why but I always felt that my life could not go forward without me leaving the country. This in its self was funny, because I had never left the UK in all my 21 years. I had to keep trying, I couldn’t give up. Days, weeks, months passed and I still didn’t feel like I was making any progress.

6 months after the breakup I moved back to Loughborough. I felt I needed to be around friends; something I always had a lack of in Glasgow.

I only had one friend, Marianne; we met through my mum who decided that our shared respect for Stevie Nicks would be enough for us to be good friends. She was right.

However I felt I needed people around me who knew me a little better at this point in my life, so I said I was going back to Loughborough to go to college. And I did. I started a course in childcare, which I didn’t complete. Once again I decided to concentrate on saving to go travelling, and within a few months I had saved up half of the money I knew I needed for my trip of a lifetime.

Sometimes in life something isn’t meant to happen until the time is just right.

That’s what I kept telling myself when something crept up to put travelling on the back-burner, and that’s precisely what happened when my mum called.

The Beginning

Some people aren’t happy with what they have in life.   They wouldn’t be happy even if they had the moon on a stick. You can’t make people appreciate what they have or what they’ve been given, but you can make sure you appreciate your own hand of life’s cards.  When you’ve worked hard to get somewhere, or worked your butt off to get something;  When you finally achieve it, all the blood and sweat and tears, all the anger and frustration you’ve gone through, all the emotions and tireless hours of thoughts and dreams… all that makes getting something you’ve worked damn hard to get, worth it. As long as, when you’ve got it, you make the most of it.

Anyone who puts that much effort into something and then allows themselves be disappointed by the end result is only letting themselves down.  From experience I can tell you that there is nothing I work hard to get that I don’t make sure I appreciate when I’ve got it.  The last few years of my life have been filed with an endless journey. In some ways I suppose the journey was one of self discovery. I found out how hard I could push myself, how much I could give up and live without to get to my goals, and what its like to finally reach the goal only to realise the journey has only just begun.

 This is my story.  How I got to where I wanted to be only to discover that that was only half the battle. I am now walking through my life like I’m in a misty valley, visibility zero.  I know where I am but I can no longer see the path in front of me and I’m constantly guessing where my feet need to step next.  Getting here was the easy part, now I need to figure out where my life goes from here. These chapters are some bits and pieces of my journey. I hope to keep writing until my journey is complete, whatever the outcome.  I hope you enjoy reading them as much as I have enjoyed experiencing them.

Pause for though.

I ask only that I am granted the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference.

Be kind to ourselves so we may have what we need to be kind to others, even when they challenge us not to do so. Just because people don’t act like they deserve it does not mean they don’t need it.

 Smile and I will smile with you because although it can be painful sometimes, when it is the hardest thing to do is often when it needs to be done most.

See challenges in your life as the lessons you must learn, they can only repeat themselves if you have not learnt from them.

Challenge yourself to be happy… even when it feels like life is trying to get on top of you, when everything keeps going wrong, when debts are mounting and when you can see no solutions, when there is no reason for happiness.

Remember that when you are having a bad day there are people having a worse day and it is important to remind yourself that “it could be worse”. Even if you feel like it couldn’t get any worse you still have something to be thankful for, find that thing and smile at it knowing it is what is making your day a better day, even when things are at their worst.

Try not to judge others for their behavior or how they choose to live their lives knowing only that it is their choice and you never truly know what is going on in anyone else’s life but your own, and we all know sometimes we don’t even truly know that much.

Be forgiving but do not let yourself be taken advantage of. Your good nature will not go unpunished; neither will your bad nature.

To say sorry is easy, to be sorry and to show you are sorry is a much harder thing to achieve. Bear in mind that actions speak louder than words.

With every door you close behind you, you are invited to open another. It is up to you which door you choose to open, you hold the keys.

Life is your garden path, tend it well.