Setting the Scene for Neyrey Nomads!

Before I say anything - I want to set the scene for this and future posts. I will have grammatical mistakes, words spell check doesn't catch. This is not a work project, a "graded" projects or some blog for fancy people - this is just a place for me to share with you this wild ride we are about to embark on. So apologies in advance if my English sometimes sounds like a foreign language or I write like I am drunk blogging & sorry if I didn't catch the odd typo.

If you're cool with that - then please read on!

It all started about 9 months ago when we were mid way packing our home in Millbrook, NY to move to West Palm Beach when I saw a post online for this cruise AROUND THE WORLD. It was leaving Jan 5th and had an itinerary that was mind blowing. I knew at that moment that it was a trip that I was going to do no matter what obstacles tried to get in the way. Cuz I am the only idiot who is mid-way through packing our lives in Millbrook crying over how much crap we had accumulated over 18 years, that would be thinking of our next adventure.

We moved, we unpacked, I redecorated a 700 sq ft condo, our dogs swore silently at me about why we were now living in 1000% humidity, WTF were these weird things AKA lizards that caused me to scream every time I saw one and what was "hurricane season".???

I put the date on the calendar Dec 31st and began the planning.

Leaving home for a weekend is a nightmare for me. I swear just packing my meds takes a suitcase - so the thought of a trip that was 4.5 months in yet another small space (at least the Florida condo was practice for how Dre and I would survive in a cruise cabin for that long) was gonna take a miracle of ninja planning. I booked the trip on- MSC Cruises (I will go into more detail on the cruise itinerary later), found the right luggage (was it deep enough to pack a human), started daily therapy with the dogs trying to explain to them why mommy and daddy were going "bye bye for a little while" (and a-lot of reading about how dogs don't understand time so 3 months could seem like 3 days or so I was telling myself) and planning the meds - the meds would prove to be harder than all of the above but WAY more on that later.

Side note: morons taking Ozempic for weight loss should be shot - it's a Diabetes med that I cannot get now (because fucking TikTok told them it's a FAB way to shed that "extra 5 lbs) and those same assholes have convinced their GP's to write them a script! Cuz it would be covered by insurance leaving people like me who need unable to find it anywhere!

Then the most important thing was getting the green light from my hematologist oncologist. and the "team" of doctors I have on speed dial... Try explaining to a doctor/s who are treating you for some rare blood cancer that you HAVE to visit Mumbai and MUST spend a night in a bungalow over the water near Bora Bora... BUT I promise to take my meds and video call them every few weeks and promised to find labs to do my blood work in strange towns from Peru to Singapore. Not gonna lie - she was dubious. At best. But then she became a human and not just a doctor and she said "Samantha, if this is THAT important to you - then I suggest you go now while you still can". Hard to hear that was an understatement but I knew what she meant. That this stupid disease added to the already 200 other auto immunes diseases I battle daily was going to eventually make life really hard to navigate and while I still could unpack those suitcases and still remember what day it was - I should go.

So all the boxes were now checked and while it was September/October and Dec 31st was a long way away - the time flew by fast and here I sit writing this to you all on our first day in Rome - January 1st. Happy New Year!

I didn't mean for this first blog post to be "dramatic" or "morbid" but I thought it was important to explain WHY.

and HOW we found a way to leave town for 4-5 months (the people who made it possible like Destiny, Dennis and Chelsea just to name a few ** more on all of them later), WHY is was a "do it now" trip because "bucket list" trips aren't going to happen by themselves and will stay on "lists" if you don't just DO THEM. That we are not multi-millionaires but HOW we saved a little here and there and found amazing deals on boutique hotels (uh with saunas INSIDE the rooms), business class airline tix for 1/2 their regular prices and how I navigated free laundry on board our cruise. Tips and tricks I will be sharing with you along the way.

We landed in Rome this morning at 11:30am their time and made our way to the most adorable boutique hotel in the heart of the city. Martivs Private Suites. Where the Xmas decorations are still up and people are yelling Happy New Year in Italian up to us on our balcony. I swear before we leave Dre WILL be standing below me with a boombox - aka his iphone recreating a Say Anything John Cusack scene playing

"in your eyes....".

I am exhausted but I was determined to put up a first blog post. The rest will be focus on our travels and sights and cool things we find along the way. If this isn't a way to ring in a NEW YEAR - I don't know what is.

So bring it on 2023 - we are ready for everything you want to show us, throw at us and allow us to experience.

Most important - SO many people said to me through the last months how much I deserved this trip. I had a really hard time swallowing that - did I really deserve this? Well I decided in 2023 that I AM allowed to take in the good stuff, that I DO deserve this adventure and I have worked SO hard for so many years, been to enough doctors, tests, bad news doctor meetings, bad luck and just bad alot - that I DO DESERVE THIS - AND MORE!

Allowing myself to DESERVE this doesn't make me selfish or greedy or an asshole - but that I have given so much in my life, taken the hits as they have come and this is MY TURN for the good stuff!

xoxoxoxo

Sam & Dre (sleeping already)

PS: How many pieces of luggage do you think we took on this trip?