I Commute 75 Miles to Work. Yes, Really.
I commute 75 miles to work. 1 hour and 20 minutes one way.
Yes, really.
It takes me a little over an hour each way, which means there are plenty of days where I spend more than two hours a day sitting in my car.
And I get asked about it all the time.
“Why don’t you just get a job closer to home?”
Honestly?
Because I love my job.
And I love where I live.
And for me, neither one was something I was willing to give up just because they happen to be 75 miles apart.
I didn’t move to the country because I wanted convenience.
I grew up in the city. I was used to having neighbors, being able to run somewhere quickly, having restaurants and stores nearby, and not thinking twice about how far away the grocery store was.
Now I live on 20 acres in the country.
Our closest grocery store isn’t exactly around the corner. Our kids don’t have a neighborhood full of houses to run around. We drive for activities. We make trash runs in a side-by-side. And if I forget something at the store, I’m definitely not making a quick five-minute trip to grab it.
But I wanted this.
I wanted the land.
I wanted the quiet.
I wanted the views.
I wanted our kids to grow up with room to run and a childhood that looked different from mine.
I wanted to sit on our porch and watch the sunset instead of looking at the house next door.
So when we built our house, I wasn’t secretly planning on moving back closer to work.
The commute was part of the trade-off.
And then there’s my career.
I'm the Apparel Director of Design and Product Development at 1st Phorm, a supplement company based in St. Louis, Missouri.
I’ve spent a huge portion of my adult life building a career in fashion and apparel.
I went to school for fashion design. I worked my way into product development and apparel. I’ve spent years learning the business from design all the way through production, merchandising and selling the finished product.
And I genuinely love it.
Not just the title.
Not just the paycheck.
The actual work.
I like building products from an idea on a piece of paper all the way to something someone actually buys and wears.
I like the creative side, but I also like the business side. I like solving problems. I like figuring out why something isn’t selling and what we should do differently. I like seeing a product line come together.
I’ve worked too hard to build a career I enjoy to decide that it isn’t worth the drive simply because the drive is long.
Is the commute exhausting?
Absolutely.
I’m not going to romanticize it.
There are mornings when my alarm goes off at 5:30 and I would happily pretend I never heard it.
There are days when I leave work tired, sit in traffic and think, I still have over an hour before I’m home.
And there are plenty of evenings when I walk through the door and immediately have to switch from work brain to mom brain.
Dinner. Kids. Bath. Bedtime. Whatever needs to be done around the house.
Then do it all again the next morning.
It’s a lot.
But so is everything else worth doing.
The funny thing is, I don’t really see it as choosing between my job and my family.
I see it as choosing the life we’ve built.
We didn’t build our house because we wanted the easiest possible life.
We built it because we wanted our life.
The land. The house. The porch. The space for our kids. The quiet. The animals. The views. The lifestyle.
And I also wanted to keep the career I’d worked so hard to build.
So I figured out how to make both work.
Sometimes that means getting up ridiculously early.
Sometimes it means packing everything the night before.
Sometimes it means listening to podcasts for an hour on the way home.
Sometimes it means answering emails from the driveway.
And sometimes it means admitting that I’m tired and going to bed instead of trying to be superwoman.
I think we’re really quick to assume everyone should want the same version of a “good life.”
A short commute.
A house close to work.
A neighborhood close to school.
Everything within 10 minutes.
And there’s absolutely nothing wrong with wanting that.
But it isn’t what we wanted.
We were willing to trade convenience for space.
I was willing to trade a shorter commute for a career I genuinely enjoy.
And my husband and I were willing to build a life that might look a little strange on paper because it makes sense to us.
So yes, I commute 75 miles to work.
It’s not always easy.
It probably isn’t what I would recommend to everyone.
But every afternoon when I turn down our driveway, see the house we built, see my kids, the dog running around and the life we worked so hard to create…
I’m reminded why I do it.
I love what I do, and I love where I live.
For now, that’s enough!
If this is you, just know what other people think doesn't really matter.. at the end of the day, are you happy? That is always what's most important!
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