USAA, Chase, Fidelity, Oh My!
How many accounts does a person need?
I’ve somehow accumulated twenty-one different accounts strewn across eight different banks. I’ve been with one bank since 2001. My entire financial life is tied up in it. It also happens to be the least useful one once I leave for Africa.
Tracking the accounts is easy. Ending the relationships not so much.
Secka Unique Glamour
As I prepare for my year in Africa, I often get asked: Why Africa? Why a year? What am I going to do while I’m there?
Last November, I spent a day with Isatou, a female Gambian entrepreneur. That day became the subject of this piece and a reminder of how the most unexpected adventures can leave a lasting impression on us.
This is why I’m headed back to Africa.
Want to read the full story? Head to the Feature Story on Stories from the Field (found in My Notebooks).
My camping List
One thousand eight hundred ninety-one dollars to prove something to myself.
Camping Packing List:
Tent
Sleeping Bag
Propane Burner
Cooking Pot and Dishes
Outdoor Chair
Rainproof Trekking Shoes
Rain Pants
One thousand eight hundred ninety-one dollars to prove something to myself. What, I don’t know yet.
I’m what?!?!
I asked ChatGPT to profile me. It wrote, “once you’ve chosen the uncontrollable thing, you try like hell to control it.”
See, I’ve planned a year in Africa. I booked a 60-day overland drive through Southern Africa. I’m climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro even though I have no hiking experience. I’m traveling through fifteen countries, several non-English speaking ones.
But the irony that Chat is referring to is that I’ve been non-stop messaging it about Mt. Kilimanjaro – how tall is it, what’s the grade, how many miles each day. I’ve booked a driving itinerary that sticks to the main roads. I have an Excel spreadsheet including a dashboard, packing lists, project planner, master planner, budget overview, budget reconciliation, place profiles, among others.
I’ve mapped the route carefully. And I know I’ll change it. Maybe ChatGPT is right…
My synthetic voice
I asked YouTube AI for feedback on a video fully narrated by me.
Apparently, my voice sounds synthetic and lacks authentic emotion.
Hmm, maybe I missed my calling for a second career as a robot 🤖 😂
Two checked bags and a carry-on.
When I left for DC, I whittled my belongings down to 100 totes. Sell, storage, trash, or take with me. I kept the size 4 pants and my bike, planning for a body comeback with a riding plan.
When I moved back to Chicago, I narrowed everything down to 31 boxes. I never got to a size 4 so the clothes went to a local shelter. I sold the bike.
Now as I prepare for Africa, everything I own fits in three duffels.
Want or Need?
Want. To be necessary or needed. To have or feel need.
Need. Necessary, duty. A physiological or psychological requirement for the well-being of an organism.
One word leads me to the other.
I thought I wanted to be needed. I think I need to not be needed.
Two words. Tangled. Maybe Africa 2027 will help me see the difference.
It’s official.
Last March, I told my boss I was leaving and heading to Africa in 2027.
We planned to tell everyone else later this fall. And while I waited, I started preparations. A move back to Chicago. Flights and lodging booked. Money spent. Every payday, I would look at my spreadsheets. My balances shrinking. Expenses growing.
This fall came sooner than I planned. Now everyone knows. I’m not sure it matters though since my boss already started spending the salary savings. Or maybe it’s because I’ve already spent half of my total budget for the year.
I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t still uncertain if leaving my full-time job for a year of uncertainty was the right path. Ask AI, it can confirm.
A Year of Connection (to every platform)
15 platforms.
Notes or posts. Reels or stories. Shorts. Followers, subscribers, friends, community.
I’m launching a second career so I post everywhere. Last Thursday: four platforms, six posts, all before coffee. I see a notification pop up and play Guess Who.
I know which ones I want to give up but then my favorite LLM says, “Try this.”
The platforms are like the relationships in my life: the connections are scattered. And keeping hold of them feels precarious.
I’ll huff and I’ll puff and I’ll…
I walked about 40 miles while I was in Iceland. Most of those miles were on gravel with only slight inclines and weren’t particularly challenging. Then there was the hike at Skaftafell. The first mile climbed nearly 460 feet. My calves burned. My heart raced. My lungs burned. And I screamed in all caps at ChatGPT for recommending it.
Iceland showed me that walking miles and climbing a mountain require different kinds of fitness. My next step: a workout program built for climbing.
Photo: Behind Seljalandsfoss Waterfall - the day I kept going.
A Year of Connection (To Opposing Forces)
I’m giving away bags —> I just bought new duffels.
I hate bugs —> I signed up to volunteer 27 days with a conservation programme.
I am striving for stillness —> I keep filling rest periods with movement.
I wanted freedom —> I’ve obligated myself to mountains, conservation programs, the gorillas, and festivals.
I’ve heard that described as constant dialectic. I would describe it as an argument with myself that neither side ever wins.
REI and I became best friends before Iceland.
My clothing layer system works (thank you, AI, for the recommendations).
My sleeping bag was cozy, and my tent was small but warm. My new Gore-tex trail shoes kept my feet dry. And my rain pants were the best purchase I made. I hiked farther than I expected and drove 30 KMs on a gravel road along the side of a mountain.
I wasn’t always comfortable, but Iceland taught me that I was more capable and better prepared than I thought.
Photo: I stayed dry even if my glasses didn’t.
A Year of Connection (To Capital One Shopping)
Capital One Shopping has gotten the message: Tracy is traveling.
Atlas Mountain trekking and Mt Toubkal summit? How can I say no to a Kilimanjaro training ground?
Patagonia packing cubes? Of course I need more. And these match my 40L and 70L duffels.
At this point, the algorithm knows my itinerary better than most of my family and friends do.
Oh my, there’s an embankment back there!
I imagined camping in Iceland would mean sitting outside in my chair, enjoying a drink, and relaxing beneath the stars.
Instead, there was rain, cold air, relentless midges, and a chair too small to enjoy any of it. When the wind started whipping my tent around, I abandoned it for the car. For my final two nights, I booked a hotel.
Somewhere in the middle of all that, I also backed the rental car onto an embankment. It was a dumb accident, but strangers helped me get the car back on the road. The next day, I drove 30 kilometers along a gravel road on the side of a mountain.
Oddly, the embankment didn’t feel like the failure. Abandoning the tent did. The accident was something that happened to me; the tent was a choice I made.
Photo: Night 2 in a tent. I hadn’t quite figured out tent and car placement yet.
A Year of Connection (to School)
Follow-up to the spreadsheet confession: the trip isn't only tracked in Excel. It also has a syllabus.16 weeks, one per week until I leave, organized by space. Each week pairs one landscape with its real, documented history: how it was shaped, who's controlled it, what's actually happened there. I'm building it out one week at a time, and I'd love more eyes on it.
If you've read something or have something to share, send it my way or drop it in the comments.
A Year of Connection (to the Numbers)
This is how I’m planning Africa 2027. Anyone else out there love Excel as much as I do?
Just get up and move.
I learned that a new landscape doesn’t make me a different person.
Even in Iceland, I was prone to staying in the chair— or in this case, the car — rather than getting up and moving.
But since signing up for Kilimanjaro, I can’t escape the nagging question: How do I expect to climb that mountain if I won’t get up and move now? It followed me out of the car, onto the trails, and up the steep climb at Skaftafell. I watched my step count, reminded myself what I was preparing for, and kept going.
I couldn’t leave my old habits at home. Fortunately, I couldn’t leave that question there either.
Photo: The waterfall I was trying to get to.
I’ve known about this day for a year.
And then I saw the Facebook post: wedding rehearsal tonight.
I’m immediately reminded of that Sunday afternoon, lying on beds at The Mattress Store. I asked him which one he liked. He responded, it’s your bed. I pushed back. “I want to get something you like too.” He didn’t budge.
That should have been a clue that he wasn’t choosing me and I should have moved on. But I didn’t. Instead, I tried harder.
I colored my wiry gray hairs blonde. I danced to music I didn’t know. I drank bitter and hoppy IPAs. I dressed up at Halloween even though I hated the holiday.
I eventually ended the relationship but I was left with questions.
What if I hadn’t backed out of going to Key West and Fantasy Fest that Halloween? And instead allowed myself to be seen with my flabby body on display.
What if I had been able to silence the non-stop questions that live in my head, those holding my inner most fear of not being chosen?
A friend reminded me yesterday that if I was still with him, I wouldn’t be the woman I am today. The one who bared her naked body in the Caribbean Sea and had her picture taken, her body still flabby. Or the woman who knew that booking a trip to Thailand would mean the end of a different relationship and I did it anyway.
Even as I actively choose myself, I still have to acknowledge the fear of being alone forever that creeps in if I allow it.
Iceland was preparation for Africa 2027.
I drove my way around Iceland, camping, hiking, and exploring the famous Ring Road.
I went to Iceland to see if my plan for Africa 2027 was reasonable. I drove my way around Iceland, camping, hiking, and exploring the famous Ring Road. There were successes and there were challenges.
The notes that I share over the next few weeks will share what I learned, what went right, what went wrong, and what’s next.
I’m making my way through Iceland
as I prepare for Africa 2027.
With lots of time on my hands, the internal questions are non-stop, debilitating at times.
What if I have to come back and take another job that I hate just because I need the income? I started out with a great buffer but with every day that passes, I see it dwindling. And I find myself borrowing against my future even as I scream internally, this is not sustainable.
And then there was this morning. I slept in the car yet again — I have a tent. I don’t know why I’m not using it. One night I even put it up, only to take it down and retreat to the car before the sun even went down. But this morning, I didn’t want to move. It was cold and damp in the car despite the expensive sleeping bag that I bought, made for the cold Icelandic air. I laid there for more than two hours watching the sun rise through the condensation on the windshield. My full bladder pressing down on me is the only thing that got me out of my sleeping bag. And I worried, what if I really can’t escape the person I am at home, the one who doesn’t move?
My questions feel so selfish. Because I know this is a choice I am making. But choosing the risk doesn’t make the fear less real. And pretending I am not afraid isn’t helping.
Today, I feel completely deflated. Because this is one of the first times, I have wondered if I’m making the wrong decision.