FOMO-NOMO

By: Laura Boenish Photos: Max Seigal

By KAVU

February 2^nd, 2021

Fear Of Missing Out - No More

Six years ago, I was sitting in Iowa looking at an email from work that basically said, you have too much PTO (paid time off) built up...... you have to use it or lose it. For some reason I was almost offended. I remember thinking, What are you DOING? How did this happen?

"You’re one year into adulting and you’ve already been sucked into the complacent time warp that life can turn into". Luckily it was a huge slap in the A$$ and..... the beginning of my life as I now know it, and love it.

For the next six months, I planned my very first solo trip and chose to spend 2 weeks car camping my way through Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks. I felt all the "feels" on this trip. Throw any epic adjective out there and that is how I felt. I left Yellowstone with my mind blown.

"How have people known this was here and not gone"?? That trip changed my life. FOMO kicked in hard.

I wanted to see and do everything.

Around this same time, one of my father’s very good friends passed away far too young. When my dad came home from the hospital one night he said," Jim told me something tonight. He said that he’s at peace and it’s simply because he did the things he loved and surrounded himself by the people he loved".

Together these experiences helped me set my priorities straight and live by my two favorite mottos..... Do things that feed my spirit with people that fill my heart, and be fearless and relentless in the pursuit of what sets my soul on fire. From then on my heart, soul, money, time, everything, went into whatever trip was next. And if I wasn’t traveling, I was working, saving, training, dreaming, and scheming.

Within 2 years, I had made my way to Colorado to surround myself with the mountains and people who were also willing to invest their time, money, and effort, adventuring in them. Somehow Max and I found each other bumbling around Boulder …literally on bumble. Our adventuring souls clicked and before we knew it we had a Sprinter van named "FOMO-NOMO" together and big plans for some proper KAVU adventures.

We both worked hard to arrange our work and life schedules to allow us to spend five unforgettable months on the road. We didn’t get too far the first month. We ended up having so much fun in southwest Colorado. The mountains are big and the people were great.

By the time we had made it to the desert we may have been a little too late. We ended up in Lake Powell camping on June 20th, aka summer solstice, aka THE LONGEST DAY OF THE YEAR. Our minds melted a little along with our cell phones, but man...... we had a good time on the water. Our desert journey ended in “the Valley of Fire” in Utah. If someone blind folded me and dropped me off there, I'd swear I was on Mars. We woke up at 5am and didn’t feel any cooler, and by 10am, we had lost it and were fighting about who lost a spoon. We had to get somewhere cooler fast.

We worked our way up California and by the time we made it to Olympic National Park we were happily throwing the puffy jackets back on. Every time I’m in the Pacific Northwest, I can’t get enough of the cloud-play. You can sit in the same spot for hours and it never gets old. The clouds build and flow so beautifully it’s hard not to be mesmerized.

After driving five days straight we finally made it to Alaska. What a place!

Everything is next-level. The mud is muddier, the bushes are thicker, and it rains every day..... a lot.

But a little extra effort will reward you with unforgettable experiences. Camping near a glacier and being woken up by thunderous calving, or hiking to old ski huts with views you can’t even describe over every pass filled our days with stoke and joy!

We finished our trip where it all began for me. Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons. We covered a lot of ground, shed a few tears and had a few fights, but as we sat on the rocky beach in Colter Bay, I was so grateful for that email six years ago. Jim had reminded us what life is all about..... and for Max and FOMONOMO finding their way into my life.

By telling this story, my goal is to inspire people.

The most common thing I hear from people at the end of my trips is “I wish I could do that too”. And my answer is always the same, "You can"!

Seems too simple, but it's the truth. You have to set your fear and doubt aside, get a little creative, get a lot determined, take a few risks, and go all in. You have to do things that feed your spirit, with people that fill your heart; you have to be fearless and relentless in the pursuit of what sets your soul on fire, and the universe will shine down on you with KAVU days.