Managing Expectations

When people ask me "what does a tour director do?" I usually respond lightly "I point at things and take dinner reservations." A tour director does a heckofalot more than that. Once of my biggest roles is that of expectation-manager. Guests who come on tour have ideas and expectations of what they might experience. After having led dozens of tours over the course of five year, I knew what complaints to expect and had some tricks up my sleeve to prevent these complaints by setting expectations in advance. Evidently, I need to figure out how to apply these tricks to myself. I had my own expectations of our visit to Yellowstone, as well as the trip itself. When those expectations did not work out as I anticipated, I have nobody to blame but me.

We woke up very early on our scheduled day to visit Yellowstone National Park. I knew it would get busy quickly and I thought it would be neat to watch the sun rise. I planned on spending some time at the Old Faithful location and wanted to secure parking for our rig. I also desperately wanted to see the Grand Prismatic Spring. Our first few minutes into the park granted us a glimpse of a glowing sky:

"Hooray!" I thought. "A sunrise at Yellowstone! And over the very spot I want to see!" We planned on stopping at the Grand Prismatic Spring. If you are not familiar, it is a fairly visually-iconic location of Yellowstone:

Within minutes after that glimpse of sky, we rolled into fog and clouds. This was our early morning view of the Grand Prismatic Spring:

I had not managed my own expectations. I had not planned on preparing myself for the advent of weather. And I *know* better. The kids pipped up more than once "that's it? where are all the colors? aren't we going to see it?" And I shallowly responded with something like "that's just a part of traveling, especially to places in the outdoors." I didn't believe myself.

The physical clouds eventually blew over but my mental and emotional cloud hung around. I was disappointed in missing out on the part of the park I was most excited about. I mean, I still experienced it. But I did not experience it in a way I expected. Additionally, at that point in the trip, the kids had gotten comfortable whining telling me their opinions about the trip and sharing what they would have liked better. You have probably been exposed to some version of a movie storyline where a parent tries to offer a fun vacation to his family (usually, it is a goofy father figure) and the kids just want to complain and stay home with their friends for summer vacation. I felt like I was that goofy father figure, grasping for something to keep my stepkids happy. Even reading articles about being a stepparent while traveling with stepkids did not prepare me for how I felt during several parts of the trip. Disappointed. Defeated. I gritted my teeth a lot. I tried to excuse myself sometimes. I even bubbled over some, just like we saw those geysers bubble over. I expected some form of a picture postcard vacation and I got a foggy day version of it. I still experienced it, but I experienced it in a way different than what I expected. I manage expectations for a living and I couldn't do it for myself.

And, as it goes, life moved on.

Old Faithful did its thing and folks "ooohed" and "aaaahed." The clouds disappeared and I got a sunburn on half of my face. We continued on our whirlwind visit over the course of the day. We were able to see Old Faithful spew 2.5 times. We hiked some (and the kids learned what hiking at elevation feels like). We saw some marmots. We picnicked by Yellowstone Lake. We stopped at Fishing Bridge. We then had to hustle home in order to meet the unyielding demands of the kids' biomother, which meant driving some 1,450 miles in two days (and we did it with 15 minutes to spare). The trip was equally exhilarating and exhausting.

I went on a very cool trip and got to share amazing places with my Love. I added two states to my "visit list" (only three more and I will have been to all fifty states). My body connected to physical spaces that my heart holds so near and so dear. I think just breathing the air at National Park Service sites energizes me at a cellular level. And yet, I sowed personal expectations that yielded disappointments. Social media sites like Instagram and Facebook allow you to share all your wonderful experiences and show off that you are having the best time. They don't leave a lot of room for sharing about disappointments (so I turn to my blog! I know, it is technically social media, too...). Who wants to hear Elizabeth whine about how she struggles with parts of life when she if off visiting Wyoming and Montana? But my struggles were as much a part of my trip as the geothermal activity we witnessed (and smelled). Also, I am allowed to write what I want on here and nobody is making you read it.

The trip will fade into my memory as a positive experience. My brain will rearrange my recollections so I remember the fun and forget the disappointment. And I imagine when I get ready to travel again, I will forget all these life lessons about managing my own expectations that I have been exposed to this past week. And that's just life.

Side note: Midwesterners are fun. But I still say "soda."

*I wrote and posted this on my own time.