After the groundhog day that was 2020, we decided to live (work, home school, etc.) in a foreign country for the month of January. We picked the Dominican Republic as we had friends already there, and we wanted the equatorial sun for the vitamin D.

Some observations:

1. DR is a special place. We've been to a decent number of countries, and it's one of the first where we know for sure we want to go back. We didn't do much exploring due to covid, but what a treasure.

2. Travel is more cumbersome now. N95s and face shields for that long is unpleasant, especially on red eyes. Not sure we go back to normal on that front and travel looks more like Asia on the PPE front. Remember when we used to fly and just get a cold for a few days after a trip?

3. I wasn't as productive, by design. I chose beach walks and surfing over extra work. My puritanical grinder work ethic is trying not to feel too bad. Breaks are a necessity.

4. Cool thing I didn't plan for: being gone for a month broke some of the automaticity. I had to think for a second where the coffee cups are at home this morning. A lot easier to be present when automatic habits are disrupted. Good argument that we need to travel more!

5. We felt guilty about traveling during covid when so many others are stuck and struggling. What a privilege.
But from a family culture perspective, I saw this as a chance to change the narrative...

From: "Covid has been awful--we didn't get to see our friends or go to school and do sports, etc..."
To: "Without the pandemic, we never would have been able to get away for a month to paradise..."

I want my boys to look for why thing are happening FOR them, not TO them.

I'd like to make the month or more abroad per year a regular thing, but not sure the kids will be able to swing it as they get older. We'll see.

/end