Quarantine Wanderlust

Quarantine has been a very difficult time for some, while others have not been as harshly impacted. I was very blessed in the fact that I have a full time job as a teacher, and had a guaranteed income and was kept pretty busy working from home (or my parent's house) everyday. But now, the school year has ended and I have a lot more free time on my hands. It has made me reflect back on a lot of my photography endeavors of the past, my dreams for the future, and the plans that had to be canceled, changed, or postponed due to COVID-19. In this post, I thought I may share with you some of the memories and dreams that have thrived on my sense of wanderlust during this quarantine time.

Quarantine began for me back in mid March and I went from warming up East Tennessee, to snowing Pennsylvania to stay with my parents. I switched from the classroom to teaching online during quarantine, like all the teachers in the country. I was kept pretty busy. The weather was snowing or just plain muggy, so I was fine to be staying inside working majority of my days. However, we have now moved into summer and the school years ended. The weather is just now turning to warm but not humid, and without work to keep me busy, my sense of wanderlust is taking hold. For those that don't know, wanderlust is where you desire to just go places, and it doesn't necessarily have to be one location. For me, being stuck in one spot due to quarantine it making me itch to go travel.

I've been longing to travel for a long while and this summer marked the first free summer in a while where I could go on tons on adventures, both photography and personal vacations. One such trip was going to be adventures around Chattanooga with some dancers, similar to these photos below.

These photos are from two summers ago, and it was a blast! Kara, Alexa, and I basically did an all day photoshoot at ten different locations, just having fun and seeing what kind of photos we could do. I had talked with the girls about doing another photoshoot like this over the summer in Chattanooga, or even at the Biltmore Estate in North Carolina. Now that we had to postpone, and summer is starting up, I so badly just want to grab a friend and a camera and just travel. To just have fun and not worry about getting perfect photos, rather just enjoy ourselves and see what kind of photos we can get.

I also have the urge to just travel the country and travel the world. My best friend Emily and I had planned to go to Iceland next summer, overwater bungalows sometime in the future, and small adventures closer to house intermittently. Now we have to wait until we know we can travel safely. In the meantime I've been planning vacations, as well asl looking back on vacations past. These ones below are from Glacier National Park and Ohipyle State Park.

Staring at these pictures, I cannot wait to go out again and be in the beauty of nature. The world and the people in it take by breath away everyday, and I long to go back out and wander the world again with friends, family, and my camera.

Until next time! Stay safe and much love!

Laura Mantooth