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As a young adult in 2025, I was one of the kids personally affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. When schools closed in 2020, I never went back, all the way until I graduated. I missed out on my entire high school experience and stayed at home doing it online. Due to this social withdrawal, I never had any experiences that would've possibly led me to find a passion, guiding me towards a career or hobby in my adult life. I felt lost when I graduated, even though my life was just supposed to be starting, I felt like I had already failed.
Being away from people for that long made it difficult to make friends even when I reintegrated into society with my first restaurant job at 17. I couldn't relate to anyone my age. I didn't have anything interesting to talk about, and even if someone tried talking to me I never knew what to say, so it was just awkward.
I did have a few friends, if not from when I was in middle school, I had friends on the internet that I played games with online. So when I graduated, I decided to treat myself, leaving for a vacation to see my friend in California. It was easy enough to save money to afford this trip, building positive spending habits and learning discipline. I talk about this more in my Let's Grow Your Savings Together blog post.
Something I realized planning for this trip, is that I have a strangely sentimental relationship with anything outside of my room. I mean anything, the idea of leaving was such a dream to me, because not going out almost at all for years wasn't just because I did online school, but also because the pandemic made my diagnosed OCD (Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder) much more severe.
Anytime I left my room I had to wash my hands or myself before returning. If I touched something that wasn't mine, even a person, even family, I had to wash my hands, change clothes, or shower to "cleanse myself" of anything that might "contaminate" my room or things. Which made leaving the house even harder.
It was taxing to know that leaving my "safe place" (my room) would mean I'd have to do obsessive "decontamination" compulsively. It got so bad that people would call me "scale hands" because the skin on my hands was so dry it would bleed from the obsessive washing. So it was easier to just never leave. Which made me appreciate everything outside my cage even more.
Everything outside was so beautiful to me, so everywhere I went I had the camera on my phone ready so I could keep what I couldn't see very often somewhere easy to access. My phone was great for photos, but to level up the quality I recommend this tripod for better positioning, and these lenses for a clearer look, both found on Amazon. A lot of the time though my phone wouldn't capture what I was seeing the way I wanted it to, so I splurged a bit before my trip to California and got this camera on Amazon. However, I know that a lot of people like the look and feel of the more budget-friendly digital camera also on Amazon.
I figured it would be a waste to go so far from home and not be able to perfectly capture what I saw with my own eyes using my camera, and that's where my love for photography was born. With absolutely no experience in photography whatsoever, I quickly taught myself how to use it. Now, several trips later, I have wonderful photographed memories from all the places I've been, with many more to come because of how convenient flying is with my rewards points from loyalty programs. Again, off topic, but photography and travel go hand and hand, so more on how I travel here, and also my Destinations and Essentials for Your Next Trip blog post.
The photo you see on this blog I captured myself with my camera. There are tons of settings on the camera that make it easy to use if you don’t know all the fancy photographer terminology. I will say though if you are buying a camera like mine, you need a memory card like this one from Amazon to be able to keep the photos or videos you take. Speaking of videos, several people on YouTube have really helpful videos that assured me this camera is perfect for beginners without losing out on great quality. Adding a professional look to your photos for a non-professional price, which is great if you are looking to make this a passionate hobby like me. For more on starting photography, check out my photography starter pack and to earn a little passive profit on your photos, even the ones you already have, learn more here.