Zeke and Terri Adventures: PYL In-Flight: May 2, 024
Welcome Back My Undaunted Passengers:
The last four months are an absolute blur. How is it May? On January 4th, my husband Zeke somewhat reluctantly agreed to launch a midlife travel YouTube channel with me (please subscribe!).
We had no idea how much work it would take to release the first five videos on February 29th, and then continue to release new videos every Friday plus daily Shorts. Between marketing, content creation, editing, travel blogs, building a community, and looking for ways to monetize our new venture, it’s more than a full-time job. We’re on IG and FB and we have a website too.
Subscribe to our newsletter and I promise I’ll send something fun soon! In fact, the first 100 subscribers get a cool Zeke and Terri Adventures sticker that looks a lot like our cool postcards (if you’ve already subscribed, we will be sending them out when we get back from our latest trip).
We absolutely love it and would not trade for anything this time together, and what we are learning every single day. We are definitely creating new neuropathways in our brains, which is a good thing, especially as we age.
I’m sitting in the lounge with a glass of champagne waiting for my 4:35 PM flight to Rome (flight time 11 hours and 45 minutes!!!). Zeke spent the last two weeks cycling with his buddies from Santiago de Compostela and is comfortably sleeping in his Airbnb in Lisbon awaiting his quick flight to Rome tomorrow morning.
He released daily videos while on his trip (check them out on his channel) and it was great practice for what we are going to try to do as we travel from Rome to Paris via Umbria, Verona, Venice, Bergamo, and Bordeaux over the next three weeks.
We are going to learn to balance enjoying the travel time and capturing videos and images to inspire people over the age of 50 (or getting close to it) to go adventuring.
We consider an adventure anything that gets you out of your comfort zone, even if it’s just a little.
For those of you who aren’t able to venture far from your current locale, don’t worry, we’ve got you covered. You can armchair travel along with us.
If you are anything like me and want to understand where to go and HOW to do it, we are incorporating that info into the videos, too. I’m a fairly anxious traveler so knowing what to expect is helpful to alleviate my anxiety. I had to do breathing exercises in the Lyft on the way to the airport.
Our goal is to hit 1000 YouTube subscribers and 4000 view hours by the end of the summer. This will allow us to monetize on YouTube. These are very bold and ambitious goals, and hopefully not completely unrealistic.
Help an aging midlife couple (us) with another crazy, hare-brained idea (Zeke and Terri Adventures) by supporting our audacious plan and subscribe, watch, share, and comment. And if you have travel ideas or requests, send them our way. Nothing is too weird.
In August we are going to Washington DC for 10 days to house/animal sit for someone I’ve known since elementary school as she and her husband lead a river cruise in France through their travel agency, Travel Key. (We talk mor about them in our latest video on travel planning)
As if the channel wasn’t enough, I delivered my first Stanford Continuing Studies course on Navigating Midlife for Women. While I absolutely loved teaching the five-week course with some amazing women from California, Arizona, Oregon, and Washington, I took the responsibility very seriously and did a tremendous amount of research and prep.
Based on the comments last night, it was a complete success, and I am both thrilled and relieved that it is over.
Unfortunately, it’s unlikely that I will be delivering again through Stanford before January, but the gals gave me a great idea and I plan on working on an online version of the course over the summer in hopes of launching it on September 1st in honor of the five-year birthday of Piloting Your Life the book. I’ve enlisted the aid of my second child (currently called Theo, formerly known as Finn) who will be home over the summer. They have some serious opinions about online courses.
I’ll keep you posted if you are interested in attending. There will be some form of a live session to go with the online course, possibly as part of a premium version. I have most of the content from teaching the last five weeks and just need to find a way to deliver it in manageable chunks.
They also demanded a workbook for the exercises so I will be working on that too.
The future is so bright, I’ve gotta wear shades. (Thank you, Bonnie for the Balenciaga sunglasses…I’m taking a little bit of your brother Dan with me on this trip!)
Not everything is perfect so don’t let all of this goodness fool you. I hope to get back to recording Terri Hanson Mead YouTube videos to share more of the real stuff going on as well. I’ve waited so long to record a video that there are now so many ideas swirling in my brain that it’s hard to figure out where to start. That’s a June activity.
But now it’s time to wrap this up, sip the last of my champagne and get to my gate to sit on a plane for nearly 12 hours. At about 4–5 hours, major panic sets in which I am not looking forward to. I don’t like being on a different continent from my kids, as much as I like to travel. I’m always thinking of how quickly I can get back if something goes sideways. Because, you know, things have. It’s not a completely irrational concern.
Stay safe my friends in these turbulent times, especially those of you with uteri.
May you find peace, acceptance, and love today as you navigate being human.
With much love and gratitude,
Terri
This week’s song: Send Me On My Way by Rusted Root. Rusted Root has a special place in my heart. Zeke and I listened to Rusted Root very early on in our relationship, especially when we were in Tahoe. This song is about moving forward with life and being happy and hopeful about it.
Journal prompt / reflection: What am I doing to stimulate my brain? What new thing did I learn today? Yesterday?
terrihansonmead.com
Piloting Your Life (the book)
Terri Mead YouTube Channel
Instagram: terrihansonmead
