Chicago, IL

What kind of a knucklehead quits a job they actually enjoy?

Or walks away from a supportive boss and interesting assignments and one, sad plant she keeps forgetting to water?

WHO IN THEIR RIGHT MIND GIVES UP A STEADY PAYCHECK WITH HEALTH BENEFITS?

Those were trick questions; the answer is me.  My name is Taylor Malloy from Long Grove, Illinois, and effective immediately (or in two weeks, whichever comes first), I will discontinue my daily visits to the office.

I know what you’re thinking.  But Taylor!  How will you survive without reformatting the same inventory spreadsheet six different ways every morning?!  What about the free coffee?!  Or the spam potlucks?!  Or the manual sales trackers?!  Or or or the tingly feeling in your legs after you get lost in a sea of emails and realize you haven’t moved in five hours?!  True.  You bring up excellent points, Kathleen, BUT regardless of how badly I want to death-grip the sides of my cubicle wall and never let go, this decision is permanent.  Permanente.  No redoes, no takebacks, no whoopsies.

OK, so, WHAT’S NEXT?  What the heck is the plan?  Where do you go from here?

That’s easy – EVERYWHERE.

I’m taking 2018 as a mini-retirement of sorts, a belated gap year if you will.  I’ll be living out my ULTIMATE FANTASY of wandering the world and experiencing as much as humanly possible.  An entire YEAR of doing exactly what I want to do, exactly where I want to do it.  And why not?!  Last time I checked I was debt-free, kid-free, pet-free, and carefree!  Conditions are perfect.

Let’s roll through the Five W’s to answer any questions you may have, starting with…

WHAT is happening right now

I know, I know.  This is a lot to take in.  I blame Sesame Street, my parents, and The Secret World of Alex Mack for making me believe that I can do anything.

Throughout the next year, I will be living and working in (roughly) one country per month.  Instead of straight up backpacking and solo wandering, I’ll be stringing together an experiential pièce de résistance consisting of various volunteer organizations, cultural exchange programs, workaway opportunities, homestays, festivals, and extreme sports.  I want as well-rounded of an experience as I can get AND…… I want to be where the locals are.

Real talk: I’ve been dreaming about (some version of) this plan for ten plus years.  Ten plus years of spitballing, daydreaming, and figuring out how to make it work.  Welp, the time has come to say the proverbial ‘fuck it’.  It’s happening and I’m making it happen.  My way.  Right effing now.  What are we doing here if not to pursue the things that make us come alive?

My sanctioned MISSION is to:

• Get out of my privileged, middle-class bubble and crack open my heart and my mind
• Welcome the opportunity to connect with people who are different from myself
• Live in a constant state of change with a high level of day-to-day uncertainty
• Gain new perspectives and turn off that part of my brain telling me I should be scared of leaving whatever ‘track’ I’m currently on
• Challenge myself to step out of my comfort zone and lean into that discomfort in order to grow
• Explore the world and different parts of myself

While I’m at it, I need to become a functioning member of society and beef up my repertoire of basic life skills.  In a major way.  Like, right now.  I took two of those survivalist quizzes on Buzzfeed and got a combined 26%.  A NINE PERCENT on the first one and a SEVENTEEN PERCENT on the second.  It’s crystal clear that besides balancing my checkbook and making scrambled eggs, I really don’t know how to do much.  I don’t have any ‘real world’ leverageable skills.  (Unless you wanted to put me in a house with seven strangers, but I guar-an-TEE you that things would get too real.)

Put another way……. if the zombie apocalypse was tomorrow at noon, I’d probably be dead by 12:05.  I mean, I’d try to impress the zombies with my vast collection of DVDs (shout out to Columbia House DVD Club —– I couldn’t have done this without you!) but the simple act of owning Undercover Blues would only buy me ten minutes tops.

Say WHEN

I’m not getting any younger, folks, so ‘someday’ may as well be today.  The wheels have been set in motion for a January 3^rd start date, and my gap year ‘o fun will follow the 2018 calendar year.  The general plan is to be GOWN from January through December, back in time for Christmas.

Let’s be clear: my current setup in no way deserves a break.  THEN AGAIN, the quality of my spare-time haikus has taken a real nosedive in recent months.  Creative juices (eww) are all but LEACHING from my body on a daily basis, and if I don’t take corrective action immediately, I fear that I’m one step closer to becoming Milton from Office Space.  Case in point, here’s one of my haikus from last week:

I have to pass gas

But I am sitting in my

Cubicle.  Help me.

See?  SEE WHAT I’M TALKING ABOUT???  I need to get outta here.

The Air Up WHERE

Since this temporary travel timeout was created by me, for me, I get to choose the destinations.

Here’s how I’m deciding and what I’m targeting:

• NEW TO ME
  • Countries that I’ve never been to or haven’t explored properly
• SAFE FOR ME
  • Countries that don’t have a terrorism travel ban or engage in widespread gender-based violence
  • Countries that don’t specialize in smoked meats as I’ll go overboard and make myself sick
• EASY FOR ME
  • Countries that are fairly close in proximity as I want to avoid spending the entire year in airplanes, crisscrossing the globe
  • Countries that don’t impose a $290 prepaid daily fee in order to enter (I’m looking at YOU Bhutan)
• FUN FOR ME
  • Countries that offer waterslide parties or dumplings shaped like hello kitty or opportunities for me to milk cows
  • Countries that appreciate the art of mime as I only know English, bits of Spanish, and the phrase ‘You are eating a red apple’ in French

My year will be broken out into three four-month chunks = Southeast Asia is up first, followed by Europe for the summer and then back to Southeast Asia/Oceania in the fall.  Since I’ll only have ONE FREAKING BACKPACK OF CLOTHES (more on that later), I’m going to try to travel with the seasons and stay in a 60-90 degree heat bubble.

As of this moment, the first four-month chunk is LOCKED and LOADED (flights, programs, etc) starting with a one-month Spiritual Awakening & Healing program on an island in Thailand.  Then it’s off to Hong Kong, Vietnam, Cambodia, Nepal, and Northern India.  After THAT, I purposely haven’t booked anything else, as I want to assess how things are going and give myself an ‘out’ in case this whole extended international travel thing ain’t what it’s cracked up to be.  Maybe I’ll get too lonely or scared or bored or broke or maybe I’ll just really want a Chicago-style hot dog with all fixin’s.  Who knows!  It’s too early to tell.

All I know for sure is that once this crazy idea took hold of me, I was a goner……

Guess WHO

Me, silly.  T Malloy.  AKA, She Gone Girl.  Getting ready to serve you a steaming hot dish of travel soufflé.

The name She Gone Girl instantly spoke to me.  It CALLED to me much the same way as your skillet cookie begs to be introduced to my fork.  Once I googled the term ‘she gone’ and read the definition on Urban Dictionary………it was GAME OVER.  Thanks for coming.  Tip your waitress.  Grab your coat on the way out.

Just to prove that there certainly ARE bad ideas in a brainstorming session, here are a few of my rejected blog names that didn’t make the cut:

Lost Be the Lady,  Travel: Party of One,  Travel Life Crisis,  30 Something Somewhere,  Lost Sole,  Sole Sister,  Flying Solo,  Lone Wolf,  Lone Ranger,  Singled Out,  Single Release Party,  Ms. Worldwide,  Sparkle Motion & the Shoeless Armada,  See Barb Fly,  Barb Gets a Passport,  Get Gone,  Bon Ma Loy-age

I just made up about half of those and they. are. terrible.  Point made.

But WHY

This isn’t about me running away from anything; this is about me running towards a dream I’ve had since I became an ‘adult’.  There’s so much OUT THERE to experience.  So much to see and do and eat and drink and love and ride and play and dance – I want to do it all.  Soak it all up, breathe it all in.  Dive headfirst into life.  Here one minute……. gone the next.

No, I’m not having a quarter third-life crisis.  No, I’m not scared about my biological clock running out of batteries or my eggs shriveling up inside of me and scrambling themselves (Hey! That’s one of the two things I know how to do!  Stop stealing my thunder!).  I’m not rebelling against societal norms or taking a stance for single women everywhere or trying to find the meaning of life.  I’m just so gosh darn CURIOUS of what else is out there and FOCUSED on pursuing the things that make me happy.

IN CONCLUSION, if you’d like to follow along on my She Gone Girl journey – I would adore it.  Just pop your email address into the little ‘subscribe’ box on the right (or below), and you’ll get weekly(ish) updates from the road.  If not, I’ll catch you on the flip side circa Jan 2019.

Here’s to a full year of not really knowing what I’m doing or where I am.  Confusion is the new black.

Over and out, sports fans.