July 18th

Rainbow umbrellas over Kilinskiego St in Bialystok

I went for a morning walk around the city, the weather is changing and for the next week temperatures will be back to normal 22–24C. It was a very pleasant and quiet walk. I am very glad to live here, I enjoy the city and the whole area of north-east Poland. As I was walking, I was able to put some thought about my vacation and my road trip:

• I am happy that I decided to go on this trip, even though I am still a little tired today.
• I am sad that my two weeks of freedom are ending, but I can already plan the next trips (be it one day or weekend excursions).
• I am happy that for two weeks I completely cut out any thoughts about work, only today they are coming back…
• I am happy that from what I planned for this trip only two things were a disappointment (trip to Riga and trip to my sister in Warsaw) and that there were a lot of pleasant, unexpected surprises (trip to Chelmno, my stay in Dundaga in Latvia, trip to Kaunas).
• I lost 2 kg even though I ate a shitload of ice cream during those two weeks.
• I drove about 3000 km, with no speeding or traffic tickets (yet… I might be getting a ticket from photo radar in Lithuania in the mail).
• I discovered unexpected strength in myself — twice when faced with a crisis (my sisters’ apartment and car breakdown 800 km from home in a foreign country), I only once had a strong but thankfully short thought about drinking.
• I was able to face those problems heads on and search for a solution and not a temporary relief.
• I know now that I can travel by myself, stay in hotels, and not be tempted to risk my sobriety and recovery.
• I want to travel more, I want to see new places, that gives me so much pleasure and happiness — now to figure out how I can achieve that.
• I wasn’t as prepared for this trip as I could — that is a lesson for future trips (take more care to prepare the car).
• I did rush my travel occasionally, trying to fit too many things in a day — unnecessarily — there is no possibility to see everything that there is along the way, and it is ok to skip some points and to be surprised by seeing something that wasn’t planned.

Overall — I am happy about my trip, happy about this vacation, happy about where I am in my life, happy about who I am now, happy about where my life is going, and happy about how I am developing my life anew.