I can't describe an epiphany, but I know it when I have it

Clicking the pics is the thing to do, their so much bigger and easier to view.

Sand Dunes National Park.

Looking at my maps last night while trying to figure out if I should go to New Mexico to see the birds at Bosque Del Apache or head for the warmer weather of southern Arizona... I had an epiphany.

Sometimes I have to force myself to break old habits because change does not come easy to many people, including myself. I get stuck going to the same places and doing the same things because there are places I enjoy going to more than others, so I tend to gravitate to those places until I get in a rut and realize that some of these places I've been to over and over are getting difficult to find something challenging to do, or interesting to take a picture of. Thank goodness for sunsets their not only beautiful but always different.

But it's hard to break these old travel habits even for someone like me that likes to go to new places. Like most folks, I get lazy and tend to take the easy way out: staying with the familiar, the unchallenging, the road most traveled; I like to think of these places that I'm attracted to as "towns that I know where the hardware store is," and going to these places is like putting on a pair of old slippers. It's comfortable, it fits just right, it might be the closest thing a full-timer has to a conventional home, but just like your old slippers... It smells.... It smells of stagnation, it wreaks from lack of inspiration and the foul odor of boredom can permeate daily life.

I think Snowbirds are a good example of RVers not looking for anything but a home. They're not really interested in something different, in general their just wanting a place to spend the winter or the summer that has good weather. And those two places they go to every year are "home". They know exactly where they're going to be from month to month, they know where the hardware store is, but most importantly it's a familiar place with familiar faces which is exactly what  "home" is supposed to be.

I also understand driving around in, or towing a large RV is not really conducive to turning on to strange roads that you've never been on before, so it feels safer to stay on the roads that you're familiar with, but of course, those familiar and welcoming roads always lead you back to exactly where you were before.

So what is the point of all this, and how did I manage to spell epiphany, let alone know what it means? The point of this is, by looking at the map and the same roads that I always use, I've been missing the solution to my "not knowing where to go" problem. But since this post is getting a little long, I'll have to finish my tale tomorrow.

                         theboondork

Christmas cactus blossom

My grandson watching the creek go by, probably daydreaming about being a pirate and sailing down the Creek.... Oh wait a minute that was me.