2022 Resolutions

Welp, it has been a weird, disappointing, exciting, and interesting year, but we made it and this house is happy and healthy, so I guess we're doing something right. Not everything is great, but we do what we can with what we have to work with. We welcomed a new baby to the family, while also saying goodbye to our furry little girl. We started to get back to normal, realized we couldn't, and now we're trying again. 

So, what do you think 2022 has in store for us? I don't love making resolutions, because they rarely turn out, but travel ones are usually pretty safe. Well, for me, it means more travel (I'm carrying that over from 2020), and getting back on a plane. In fact, I'll be on one in just a week, which is scary and exciting all at once. This last year we were able to squeeze in two short road trips, and if all goes as planned, this year will see me doing a few short trips and a few longer ones. 

I have tickets to Tucson in January, Las Vegas in February, we'll see about July, and we have tickets on a new airline (Play) to Paris in September. I'm hoping to get a few more quick trips in there somewhere, but we'll play those by ear. 

I'm going to continue doing our Destination Date Nights, even though these last few months saw me slacking. This season is always busy for me with birthdays and family things. These are what I had planned for the first half of last year, which I made pretty good progress on:

• New Orleans (Mardi Gras) ✓
• Norway ✓
• China (Chinese New Year) ✓
• Dublin (St. Patrick's Day) ✓
• Morocco ✓
• Scotland
• Spain ✓
• New York City
• Chicago ✓
• Iceland
• Mongolia ✓
• Tokyo ✓
• Sydney
• Moscow
• African safari (Kilimanjaro)
• Cuba

In 2021 we also got to:

• Malta
• Myanmar/Burma
• Amsterdam/Netherlands
• Thailand

Oops! I guess I didn't get to as many as I hoped. I tried! One a month was pretty good though. So, upcoming, we do have Australia. I've also sourced a new background company for ones I need to have customized, which will make these a little easier to get to:

• Iceland
• Moscow
• African safari
• Toronto (Canada Day)
• New York City
• Boston
• Prague
• Portugal
• Germany (Oktoberfest)
• Auckland

And we'll see where we go from there, unless you have some specific suggestions for me. 

Everyone on my friends list is vaccinated now and either boosted or will be boosted (or boosted again), so I'm hoping we'll also get to do in-person gatherings of more than a handful of us and we'll get back to Harry Potter parties and birthday blowouts and all those fun things. We both had pretty low-key birthdays this year, which was fine. We spent quality time with our loved ones. I'm hoping to do that and also party hard with friends this year.

So, here's what I know I'll also be looking forward to in the coming year, because I'm not trying to make any resolutions beyond travel ones:

• Learn French (I said I might do this last year, but I have an actual goal this year, so it's going to happen as best as it can.) We now have a lifetime subscription to Babbel now and I've been binging Emily In Paris on Netflix.
• I'll still be doing Zoom brunches with friends, but also a few in-person ones, too. 
• We'll be eating out more in restaurants that make it safe to do so. Portland has a running list of establishments that require a negative Covid test or vaccination proof to dine inside, and we've been making use of that.
• Keep striving to be as smart as possible and not get Covid! I will continue wearing my masks, washing/sanitizing my hands often, social distancing where I can with strangers, and enjoy outside things like street art and gardens.
• Being kind to strangers, because everyone's still having a rough go of it out there.

I'm looking forward to what 2022 has in store for us all. Here's to brighter days with more travel and more fun with friends...and more food that we don't have to cook ourselves or eat inside our own house.

What are your resolutions or hopes for the new year? Any travel plans?