The Impracticality of a Midlife Gap Year
I read this and immediately wanted to do it: take a midlife gap year. I never took a gap year, going straight from high school to college to grad school to working full-time. I traveled a lot during that time, but it three-week-long trips; not a gap year.
I sometimes ask Josh if there’s any chance that we’ll live in Oxford for a year. For a half-year? A few months?
But then reality kicks in because my life is very different from Caroline Harper’s life. I have a career, and I love my career. While I can work from almost anywhere since I work remotely, I still need to have my bum planted in a seat or be available for meetings for the bulk of east coast daytime hours. There is no natural break in that timeline to slide in a gap year.
There is Josh’s career, the twins’ education, loved ones I want to see on a regular basis. There is the question of money, the house, the pet. The friendships, the committees, the communities. There are a thousand reasons why this isn’t practical or responsible. Why doing it would bring bigger drawbacks than any lessons gained.
And yet I still see myself hanging out in Oxford, reading a book on a grassy space.
I like the idea of a gap year. I don’t know if I’d like the consequences of a gap year. But if I could take one, I’d definitely head to Oxford.
What about you? Where would you go?
12 comments
I definitely didn’t take a gap year between high school and college – this was back in the days (2001) where taking a gap year meant losing health insurance/finding my own, while going straight to college meant I could stay on my parents’ insurance until I graduated.
At this point, I’ve got the suburban American thing going on, and taking a midlife gap year just feels too tricky. I could probably manage it with my job – there are plenty of travel nursing positions available (a year or two ago, one of my colleagues did an assignment in Hawaii during the winter – she got a pretty reasonable schedule, a paid-for apartment, and good salary as part of the deal). The rest of my life, though, just can’t be packed up that way. I have considered it, however, when I get more to “retirement” age!
If I could go anywhere and no job/life considerations (pure fantasy), I’d love to live in Prague for a year. If I was being realistic, I’d love to take a travel assignment in Hawaii.
I want to live abroad with my kids for a year, which is kind of what you are talking about. The logistics are super daunting. I’d lose my tenure, the kids wouldn’t be guaranteed spots at the same school when they come back because of the way the lottery system works in San Francisco. And then there is my husband’s job, and the fact that he doesn’t speak Spanish (I want to go to a Spanish speaking country). We are getting to the point where if we really wanted to do it we’d have to start talking very seriously about it, but every time I think about bringing it up I’m too overwhelmed. We’d all have to really want to do it and right now I think I’m the only one who really wants to do it. Still, it’s been a life long dream, so do I just give it up? I really don’t know. I lived abroad as a child and it shaped who I was in really positive ways. I want that for my kids. But it is really, really hard.
I took a kind of gap year….I was enrolled in college and went the first semester and then just kind of flaked off and didn’t attend class the majority of the time during the second semester, because due to one of my courses getting cancelled, I had a large gap between and would go to one class then not go back for the second. I worked as a waitress and partied pretty hard that year. So I did that until my dad saw my grades And flipped out and basically told me to go to school and do something with my life or get out of his house, so I got my shit together enough to finish school and start a career.
Right now, though?? I would die for a gap year. Soooo impractical for all the reasons you mentioned. I think this really only works for the independently wealthy because otherwise how would anyone manage? If we are talking a true gap year with no real responsibilities and the freedom to travel or lay on a beach or whathaveyou.
It’s funny because my kid has been talking about wanting to take a gap year after she graduates in June and I am all HELL NO about it.
That is such an unrealistic fantasy I can’t even think of where I’d go…I think it’s realistic only for a very narrow category of jobs, and people who have rich parents to support them/rich spouse/inheritance.
We had our stars aligning exactly a year ago. DP was being laid off and was not allowed to work during the 4 month notice period. I was between projects, Suzy not yet mandatory school age. In theory we could have gone for longer, but for the combination of us 1 week in Thailand and 4 weeks campervan-ing in New Zealand was perfect.
(Professionally I did sort of 4 gap/travel/work years at the beginning of my career. Still very happy I did, it makes a good story now. But the social cost of being away is high indeed. Not many relationships/friendships are made for telecommunication.)
I love *the idea* of a gap year, but just as it was impracticable for me to do that as a young adult for financial reasons, it is equally impracticable now. But I can dream. . . .
I would love to spend the gap year at home, just spending my time differently than I currently spend it. I would volunteer my time in place of (most of) my current work hours, pay much more attention to healthful diet and exercise, and spend extra time with my sons.
My family took a gap year (well, a gap nine months). It was super easy.
We rented out our house, boarded the pets with friends and moved abroad. We lived in a small apartment in a big city. The kids went to the local public schools.
Our jobs can be done remotely, so that wasn’t an issue. We made lots of new friends, had so many adventures and immersed ourselves in a different culture.
In NZ, we have called this “doing our OE (overseas experience)” for decades, and usually involved travelling to the UK and working before coming home and “settling down.” I never did a traditional OE, but my final year of high school was an exchange student year in Bangkok, Thailand. Then later, I was a diplomat there for three years.
Five years ago, when DH’s position was made redundant, we took off to Europe and spent five months travelling, including three months in Italy. These days, I still dream of travelling again – it won’t be a mid-life gap year, but will be a retirement gap year (or two?). That’s becoming quite common in NZ too – Old People’s OE!
I don’t much care where I go – as long as I get to be somewhere interesting, and get to stay there for a while. I don’t want to move on all the time, but want to settle in. France or Italy or Portugal or Mexico (though I’ve never been there) or my perennial favourite, Thailand. Also, I’d love to live in DC or environs for a while too. House swap anyone?
Also – all those obstacles you listed could be overcome. In fact, do it now, rather than later. Your twins are young enough now to take a year in a different education system. Your work is transferable, and Josh is young enough to recover from a year off (or could get work there, or transfer? I’m not sure what he does), whereas that is much harder in your 50s. Friendships and family relationships survive a year long gap – there’s Facetime/skype, social media etc these days, and good old fashioned letters. Your parents are probably young enough to be able to leave them, etc etc. If you want to do it, you could.
Gap years were not “done” when I was younger — in fact, I don’t think I’d ever heard of the thing before Prince William took his. 😉 And I don’t think I would have been able to quit my job outright (abandon my paycheque) in order to take a gap year. Maternity leave was supposed to be my “gap year” (or 9 months, which is what mat leave was at the time — it later was extended to a year, and you can now take up to a year & a half, although your benefits will still be the same as if you’d just taken the year) — but I never got to take that. And yes, I know, staying home with a baby is not a sabbatical/vacation — but it would have been a change of pace & scenery. 😉 I was ecstatic when I realized I was due in November and would miss out on most of the year-end rush at work… and then devastated when I lost the baby and had to return to work right when it was all starting. Insult to injury…!!
One of my high school girlfriends worked for the provincial government in British Columbia & was able to defer part of her salary from each cheque, and then every few years, she could take a paid sabbatical for several months. She extended her maternity leave that way, and years later, when her girls were young teenagers, she spent the entire summer taking them on an epic road trip across Canada. I thought that was fabulous and I was soooooo jealous. My company theoretically started offering sabbaticals & phased retirements toward the end of the time I was there, but it seemed like only high-up executives with connections were allowed to take them. 🙁
We’ve done it twice– sabbatical is a great perk for an academic (and my husband telecommutes). It’s not really “travel the world without a job” but it has been nice to live someplace we wouldn’t normally be able to afford for a year.
I just read Eloisa James’ Paris in Love, which is (more or less) a gap year that her family spends in Paris. I would love to do that (travel for a year, not necessarily spend a year in Paris), and I could…in about 7 years, when I am eligible to retire. I guess it could count as a gap year, as it would be a year between my career and whatever I’m going to do with the rest of my life… My husband says he wants to tour the country via RV, but I doubt that’s actually true. Stay tuned, I guess.
I am nurturing a plan to take such a gap year with my husband when we are no longer actively parenting. We’ll go everywhere, kinda like we used to. Europe, Asia, South Pacific, South America….
Oh, now you’ve got me dreaming.