The first time Trenton was sent to Amsterdam for a work trip, he was smitten. We started fantasizing about a vacation we could take to Europe together, his company footing the bill for his airfare, and us splitting the cost of mine. His company doesn’t encourage employees to take their partners on work trips, but they don’t actively forbid it either.

At some point the conversation shifted from a vacation, to the crazy idea of what if maybe we could actually live there? I didn’t know it at the time, but the second time he went on a work trip to Amsterdam, he was looking at the city with a more discerning eye. Could we live here?

Very few places in Amsterdam have air conditioning and Trenton was there in the middle of summer during a record-breaking heat wave. The fact that he came home with stars in his eyes, madly in love with the city, is a huge testament to how great it is. Could we live here? Hell yes.

Even having never been to the Netherlands, I was all-in from the start. I had grown exhausted of the politics and small-town feeling of Kentucky, and I was ready to get out. I could see a potential path in front of me, the possibility of being a medium-big fish in a small pond, and it wasn’t what I wanted. There are movers and shakers in Kentucky doing great things and I was starting to get to know some of them, opportunities beginning to approach. I hadn’t committed myself to anything too big to walk away from yet, but it felt like my time to cut ties and run was becoming limited. If ever, now was the time to go.

I wanted to be surrounded by vibrancy and ideas, and to feel inspired. Did I want to move to a tiny country I had never seen where I didn’t know anyone, didn’t speak the language, and didn’t have anything lined up for employment? Hell yes.

To be fair, I’m always up for a trip. To the grocery store, to the next town, to a new country, I’m always in. The critical question isn’t “where are we going?” it’s “how soon can we leave?”

The next step in making the dream a reality was getting Trenton’s company to see why him being in Amsterdam would be a good idea. Just like I’d been dropping hints into his psyche months before, Trenton started planting ideas in his managers’ heads, asking questions about the support they currently had in Europe, and mentioning that he was willing—eager even—to live somewhere other than Kentucky.

After months of laying the psychological ground work, his manager agreed that she would get the wheels turning and start moving his transfer request up the line. I think it was at least two years from the time Trenton and I decided we wanted to live in Amsterdam to the day we finally boarded a plane.

Two years of planning, fretting, and paperwork. My god the paperwork…