On the Road, Day 1: On the concept of bravery

Greetings from rain-soaked Wytheville, Virginia! Day 1 of #krissyscaliforniaadventure is on the books, and all things considered, it was pretty uneventful. That means I had a lot of time to think about things (always a favorite past-time of mine). One of the things I thought about was the concept of bravery.
Throughout this process of moving to California, many people, both loved ones and random people, have told me how brave I am. Not that I want to be an obnoxious contradictory twat, but I have to be honest, I don't really feel like "brave" is accurate adjective here. I'll take the praise, to be sure. I'm just not really sure I deserve it.
Personally, I don't think I'm brave; I'm just stubborn. It's always been a dream of mine to live in California; now is the time in my life to do it. Once I made the decision, and made my intentions known, there was very little that could have stopped me because, as you may remember from two sentences ago, I'm stubborn AF. 
I suppose I understand how my actions can be interpreted as brave; although it's hard for me to apply that term to myself when this decision came easily, almost naturally. Not that it hasn't been difficult, emotionally, mentally, even physically. But even pushing through in the face of the challenges doesn't make me feel brave, because they're the natural consequences of the decision that I made. 
When I think about the bravest thing a person can do, I always come back to being a parent. That's something I'll never have the courage to do, because the stakes are so fucking high. (Also, I have no interest in trying to explain to a tiny dictator who sits in their shit why they need to eat their chicken fingers.) Packing up and moving to a new state? Sure, it's a risk, but a calculated one. Cooking a human, birthing it, and then keeping it alive day after day? That's courage. 

Other thoughts from the road...

• My lower back started hurting before I even got out of Pennsylvania. When the fuck did I become old enough to have chronic pains and discomfort when all I'm doing is sitting? I'm not ok with this.
• I wish it was ok to play drinking games while driving. So far, I've decided I would take a drink everytime I see a Confederate flag south of the Mason-Dixon Line, everytime I see a mega-church south of the Mason-Dixon Line, and everytime I see a car as jam-packed as mine. 
  
• For a Hazletonian, it's not a legitimate road trip unless you take a box of Senape's pitza with you.
  

Four hundred twenty miles down, 2,560 to go!