Over the past six years, so much has happened in our lives — Trent’s and mine.
We broke up, sold the house we had together in East Atlanta, and walked away separately. Trent kept the van we had originally purchased together, and I went my own way and got my own van — a Class B RV, a Travato.
We both love the outdoors and freedom, so it wasn’t surprising that we kept gravitating toward similar things: similar places, similar lifestyles, just in separate vans. After five years of living independently while continuing to work our full-time jobs — jobs that had gone fully remote thanks to COVID — we found our way back to each other.
This year, things changed. Most companies began requiring employees to return to the office, including mine. I moved back to Georgia to keep my job, and I managed to make it work for a while. Without getting into too many details about the other challenges I was facing at work, everything combined was pointing me toward one decision: choosing myself — my mental and physical health.
Fifteen days ago, I walked away from a six-figure salary, a stable career, and a city office view to live fully in my van and go wherever I want to be — with my 13-year-old golden retriever, in what may be his last few precious years.
It wasn’t an easy decision, and I’ll admit the doubts still creep in from time to time. But when I was making this choice, I made sure to sit with those feelings consciously — really feel them, not push them away. And in that stillness, I realized it didn’t feel like a choice at all. It felt like life had been quietly guiding me here, closing doors one by one, until this was the only one left open.
So here we go.