Latest / The Scene Projects / Kerry Damiano on Pageantry, Passion, and the Ms. World Traveler Journey
Transcript
- 0:03This program is part of the Scene Projects podcast network.
- 0:07Scene Project features interviews with independent musicians, comedians, and artists
- 0:12from across the Midwest.
- 0:15Become part of our community and support local art wherever you are.
- 0:28Welcome in to another exciting episode of Real Biz.
- 0:31I am your host, Bubba Starts, and with me today is founder of Ms.
- 0:35World Traveler, Carrie Damiano.
- 0:38Carrie, welcome to the show.
- 0:40I'm so excited to be here, Bubba.
- 0:42I'm excited to have you.
- 0:43I I commented early on that you're, you're you showed up looking exactly like your headshot,
- 0:49and I'm not quite used to that.
- 0:52But, you absolutely lovely, and and we're gonna have a great conversation today.
- 0:56So looking forward to that.
- 0:58Before we get into all the things that you're doing now, I just wanna give you an
- 1:01opportunity.
- 1:01Give us a little bit of your backstory, and we'll pick the conversation up from there.
- 1:06Okay.
- 1:06Great.
- 1:07Well, I have been in the pageant industry for over four decades, so that's sort of where the
- 1:13banner, the whole hair, makeup, all of that comes from.
- 1:16So, you know, I'm kinda surprised you're surprised I would show up like this.
- 1:22I hope you weren't expecting sweats.
- 1:25I don't own any sweats.
- 1:27Anyway, I'm excited to be here and tell you a little bit more about my story.
- 1:31How Miss World Traveler came about.
- 1:34I've been to see, it's a 146 countries now.
- 1:38So, been around the world a time or two, and I love to share that with my visitors and
- 1:44followers and, inspire women to travel.
- 1:50Incredible.
- 1:50Well and we talked a little bit about, my relationship with missus South Dakota
- 1:55International, Charlotte Roop, and, you know, following her journey over the course of last
- 2:01year, not just winning the South Dakota competition, but then going on to the
- 2:04international and seeing what it was really about and what it meant to, all of the the
- 2:10women that were part of that pageant and just a whole a whole different world that I got a
- 2:15small peek into, but a very interesting place.
- 2:18And one thing that was common, across the board with these women was the impact that they were
- 2:24able to have on their communities, not just at the international and national level, but at
- 2:28their local communities.
- 2:30Obviously, Charlotte is the founder of Operation Combating Veteran Suicide, and that
- 2:35kinda became her platform for doing that.
- 2:37But what, you know, what does it mean for someone in the pageant industry?
- 2:43What what is it that drives some of these women to keep showing up?
- 2:47I mean, some of these people do this.
- 2:49I I even though it's not maybe making a living that they do it, you know, for you know, it's
- 2:54it's a twelve month ordeal every year.
- 2:56It And and many of them are in it for years and years and years, and they move from around to
- 3:02different systems, some with the same with the same system.
- 3:05So, you know, it's it's a sisterhood.
- 3:07That's probably the main thing that draws women to it.
- 3:10It's a sisterhood.
- 3:12You know, we talk a lot about brotherhood through sports or through military service or
- 3:17whatever, but this is a sisterhood.
- 3:20And so once you are on the inside and you understand what it's like to be out on stage
- 3:26and the lights and you know, you do it even when your knees are knocking and you're so
- 3:32nervous you can hardly speak, but you do it.
- 3:35You're there that develops a bond.
- 3:37And and so the sisterhood is one of the things that draws women to it.
- 3:41The thing is having a voice.
- 3:43Just like your friend, Charlotte, you were just talking about, she has a voice in her
- 3:48community.
- 3:49And and that's important to a lot of people, and that's why they wanna get involved.
- 3:53It just gives them, one, the motivation, and two, more opportunities, more doors open if you
- 4:00have a title.
- 4:02So but I think that those are the two things that really draw women into pageantry as well
- 4:06as wanting to improve their skills, their speaking skills, their presentation skills,
- 4:11those kinds of things.
- 4:13Yeah.
- 4:14And as someone who realized the value in, community, by joining the Midwest Country Music
- 4:20Organization, I always also realized over the last year as being the content creator of the
- 4:25year, what a title can do for you.
- 4:27You know, being able to introduce myself, hi.
- 4:29I'm Bubba Starts.
- 4:30I have an award winning podcast, has utterly changed my life.
- 4:33So I can only imagine for some of these women who have wanted to, you know, impact their
- 4:38communities and were in so many ways that more doors open when you have a crown and a sash,
- 4:44for whatever reason.
- 4:45Right?
- 4:46Right.
- 4:47Who knows why, but it just does.
- 4:49That little bit of, you know, the I I call it juice in my business.
- 4:54Right?
- 4:55That that you have.
- 4:56Right?
- 4:57Well, that that people feel somebody else said you were worthy.
- 5:01Right?
- 5:01Judges.
- 5:02Or for me, it was the members of my community that I had been serving that voted for me, in
- 5:08the award show last year that it it's you know, somebody else said that you're worth it, and
- 5:14then that means so much more to the outward world.
- 5:16I mean, the the award to me personally, because it was voted on by our members, means a lot to
- 5:22me in that personal way, but the the the award on the mantle doesn't really mean anything.
- 5:27Also, unless you use it and you're out there
- 5:30That's right.
- 5:30That and putting that out there.
- 5:32Yes.
- 5:33You know, it's it's that sense of feeling worthy, but also that you've been seen, that
- 5:39you're not just toiling in anonymity.
- 5:42People see what you're doing, and it's recognized.
- 5:45And there there's an internal motivation from that as well as I think people wanting to, you
- 5:50know, grab onto the cocktails of success.
- 5:52You say, well, somebody else thinks that is good, so it is good, and therefore, I should be
- 5:57part of it.
- 5:58I use that phrase all the time, toiling in anonymity.
- 6:02And I just, I I don't I most of it right?
- 6:04The quiet desperation that that people live in.
- 6:08And, you know, for me, two years ago, Carrie, I was a welder in a factory and and fully living
- 6:15in that.
- 6:16I had always been a performer, a songwriter, spent, you know, twenty five years on stage
- 6:20playing music on the weekends, but it it wasn't enough.
- 6:24I wanted my life to leave more of an impact and leave a legacy for my children and my
- 6:30children's children and and not to just kind of you know, I saw it.
- 6:34I saw a lot of guys around me that were twice my age, still working, and their bodies were
- 6:39broken.
- 6:40I was just like, I can't I can't do this.
- 6:42I don't see myself here in twenty five years, right, doing praying for retirement.
- 6:47Like, that's not going to be me.
- 6:49And if I'm and if I'm going to change it, I need to change it now while I still have a body
- 6:54and an able mind and I now have a significant injuries, you know, knock on wood, that that
- 7:00were in, you know, inhibiting me from doing that because I also, like you, have a passion
- 7:05for travel.
- 7:06And now I'm able to bring that passion and my passion for independent music and conversations
- 7:12now, altogether into one thing and to do that.
- 7:16So were you a
- 7:17It's your keyword.
- 7:18Your keyword there is tension.
- 7:20You know, we we talk a lot about that.
- 7:23That if you are doing what you are passionate about, it's not really work.
- 7:26Even though it is work and you work hard at it, it's you it comes from within, and so the
- 7:32motivation is there.
- 7:34The reward is internal.
- 7:36You know, you're you're living your dream, and I'm so happy to hear that you left what you
- 7:42were doing to live your dream.
- 7:44Yep.
- 7:44I mean, isn't that the goal of life?
- 7:47Right?
- 7:47Life is life is too short to do something that you don't like.
- 7:51You know?
- 7:51I mean, obviously, we have to provide for our families and and that sort of thing.
- 7:54So that has to be an ish you know, factor, but it doesn't have to be the whole thing.
- 7:59And so I love that you have followed your passion.
- 8:02Right.
- 8:02Well and we talked a little bit off camera about not necessarily being money money
- 8:06motivated, but being impact motivated.
- 8:09Right?
- 8:09Impact driven to do what we're doing, and I just, I can't imagine living a different life
- 8:15at this point.
- 8:16And now we're very fortunate that we have built a platform that has achieved those certain
- 8:21level of, you know, numbers and outward appearance that people are now gravitating to
- 8:26that are willing to invest in us and to invest in it, whether it's advertising or sponsorship
- 8:31or, you know, what whatever avenue it is or helping them to do that, a mentorship role that
- 8:37we're kind of finding ourselves in that we're really grateful to to have spent the time
- 8:43necessary to build that platform.
- 8:45Because I think a lot of people do quit, and a lot of people would have quit in our situation.
- 8:49You know?
- 8:49Essentially, taking two years
- 8:51jump to the top.
- 8:51Right.
- 8:52Right?
- 8:52Exactly.
- 8:54You have to build, and it takes a while.
- 8:56Yeah.
- 8:57Well and for me, I knew that to build it, that the timing was right because of the changing
- 9:02media landscape that if we wanted to do this, it wasn't gonna be a slow roll.
- 9:07The time for the slow roll would have been ten years ago, getting into podcasting and being
- 9:10able to, you know, baby step there.
- 9:12I knew I needed to invest these sixty, seventy hours a week that you were you know, you talked
- 9:18about with with your job, you know, at a minimum, I'm working seventy hours a week.
- 9:22Right?
- 9:23That it's it's seven days a week behind the computer and doing this, and I really have to
- 9:27focus on, like, making sure that I'm taking the time away from working and kinda being on to
- 9:33spend time with the family and invest in them as well because this doesn't just happen happen
- 9:38for you.
- 9:38Nobody's coming to save you
- 9:40Right.
- 9:41And to give it to you.
- 9:42You have to go build it.
- 9:44Yeah.
- 9:45And and once you've left your, you know, your steady paycheck, there's no safety net.
- 9:52So it's all on your own back.
- 9:54And, you know, harder the work, the more successful you can become, but based on your
- 9:59own heart.
- 10:01Yes.
- 10:02So, obviously, you have a passion for traveling.
- 10:06Was that early on, or was this something that as you were kind of, you know, in in your
- 10:12traveling day, obviously, with the pageants, I I know there's a vast amount of travel involved
- 10:16in that as well.
- 10:17Is it something that you inherited through the work of the pageant, or is it something that
- 10:22you've kind of always had inside of you?
- 10:24Well, inherited is the right word, but not from pageants, from my mom.
- 10:29My mom had a great wanderlust because her mother had a wanderlust, and she wasn't afraid
- 10:36to just, you know, load her kids up in the car and take them anywhere.
- 10:39And so my mom grew up with that, and she did the same for us, my brother and sister and me.
- 10:43So we were very used to road trips and, you know, going here and there.
- 10:48And then as a college graduation present, my mom took me on my first international trip.
- 10:54And from that point, I was addicted.
- 10:57So that's kinda where it really started my great love of travel even though I had been
- 11:03doing it on a on a smaller basis for years before that.
- 11:08And so my mom and I traveled together for about ten years, and then I really started wanting
- 11:12to, you know, push the boundaries of wanting to do it by myself and travel by myself.
- 11:16And so now I'm a huge proponent of solo travel, especially for women.
- 11:21Because, you know, we we get this, well, you know, wanna be lonely or, you know, I don't
- 11:26know that I can afford it or, you know, I I I don't know that I can figure it out.
- 11:30And so we end up having all of these fears about doing it by ourselves.
- 11:34But once you can conquer your fear, just like with anything in life, if you can conquer
- 11:39conquer your fear on something, it gives you confidence.
- 11:42And once you have confidence in one thing, you tend to have confidence in other things.
- 11:46So it's just a like a vehicle to to become more confident in life by using travel as that
- 11:54stepping stone.
- 11:56I no different than the pageants are.
- 11:58Right?
- 11:58That they're a a way to build skills.
- 12:01And, yeah, it's kinda cool the parallels between the two between the two things.
- 12:06Right?
- 12:06That is exactly what they are are are confidence builders.
- 12:10And for me, I was very fortunate to have performance.
- 12:13Right?
- 12:14Like, I wasn't the performer I am today when I took the stage for my first time at 13, 14
- 12:19years old.
- 12:20Right?
- 12:20Right.
- 12:21It took a lot of time and effort and practice and, you know, watching watching back and
- 12:26reflecting on on choices made.
- 12:29And, you know, I think for a lot of female travelers that it's maybe the safety concerns
- 12:33that that scare them the most from that.
- 12:35And, you know, do what do you do?
- 12:39And I know you have the TV show and you have a lot of these things, you know, that you're
- 12:42sharing in education.
- 12:43At what point did that kind of become your focus to not just do the traveling on your own,
- 12:49but to teach others how to do that?
- 12:51Was there a point where it just clicked, or has it always been something that you've kinda just
- 12:56just done?
- 12:57You seem like you're such an educator naturally to, mentor that I I feel like you kinda came
- 13:03out of the womb this way, but maybe it wasn't that.
- 13:07Well, that's a good point, but it was a little more channeled toward pageantry.
- 13:11So I've been coaching for almost twenty five years and judging.
- 13:15So that sort of, mentoring and and that sowing into the lives of other young women, that has
- 13:21been going on for a long time.
- 13:23The whole travel thing, BizWorld Traveler came to be in 2022, so not that long ago.
- 13:30But I've been traveling since 1984 was my first overseas trip.
- 13:35So I've been doing it a long time, and it it was almost like I knew something big was
- 13:40coming.
- 13:41And I didn't know what it was.
- 13:42And I prayed about it, and I'm like, okay.
- 13:44You know, is this is this the the new big thing?
- 13:47And I always got sort of the answer of no.
- 13:49This is what you should be doing right now.
- 13:51And so I continued on.
- 13:53And finally, in 2022, it was kind of like the scales were removed off my eyes, and I could
- 13:59see what Ms.
- 14:00World Traveler was supposed to be.
- 14:01Just laid out exactly what it was supposed to be.
- 14:04And I realized that the last twenty plus years had all been for what Ms.
- 14:10World Traveler was going to be.
- 14:12Technology had to be in the right place.
- 14:15You talked about that.
- 14:16Money had to be in the right place.
- 14:19My experience level had to be in the right place.
- 14:21You know, all of these things had to sort of work together, get all the pieces in place
- 14:26first before Ms.
- 14:28World Traveler could happen.
- 14:30So here we are, and now I can talk about a lifetime of experience.
- 14:36It's a little harder to talk about your lifetime of experience when you're young,
- 14:40because you don't have enough of a lifetime yet.
- 14:43So now in my sixties, I can look back and I have all of these stories from my travels that
- 14:48I can pass on to help educate other people.
- 14:52Just incredible.
- 14:53And, yes, the brand is so just fully fledged, and I don't think that you're able to get there
- 14:59if this is something that you're kinda piecing together over time.
- 15:02Like you said, you kinda had the entire vision for what it was going to be in the future and
- 15:08the time, and it took that.
- 15:09And I feel that, like, the last twenty years of my life have all been preparation for the time
- 15:14that I'm in now and to have that available.
- 15:18I'm gonna put some, I'm gonna put some questions on you.
- 15:20I'm gonna put you on the spot a little bit.
- 15:23Favorite place to visit.
- 15:25A 146 countries.
- 15:27Let's just narrow down.
- 15:28Favorite country to visit?
- 15:30Oh, I have different favorites for different reasons.
- 15:36Like, place to go shopping would be Paris.
- 15:40Favorite sort of old home feel, London, which I'm leaving next week for London.
- 15:45And the reason I say that is I lived in London after college and went to graduate school
- 15:49there.
- 15:50So that you know, there's a little bit of an old home feel for me for that.
- 15:56And then I'm actually gonna be a a month in Australia in March, and I would say Australia
- 16:02and New Zealand are tied for me for friendliness of the people.
- 16:07Incredible.
- 16:08I have done a little international traveling.
- 16:10I actually lived, in Mexico, for a year.
- 16:13Me too.
- 16:14Yeah.
- 16:14Not in, like, resort Mexico.
- 16:16We were very, like, off the beaten path.
- 16:19They didn't see a a lot of Caucasian people where we were, especially
- 16:23It's quite an education,
- 16:24isn't it?
- 16:25Well and then not a lot of people spoke English either.
- 16:27So we really had to and not having brushed up, I would kinda went down there in a in a
- 16:31emergency, kinda static.
- 16:34Yeah.
- 16:34So it wasn't necessarily like, oh, you're thinking it.
- 16:37Yeah.
- 16:39And that's the way to learn, right, when you just truly get immersed.
- 16:43It was an experience, and we have some of our just people who absolutely are near and dear to
- 16:49my heart.
- 16:49But I actually, you know, kind of fed the family playing music in the Central because
- 16:54there was nobody like me doing that.
- 16:56So you talk about, you know, standing out, you know, the this white man down performing,
- 17:03singing, you know, American songs, you know, popular American songs at the top of his lungs
- 17:08in the Central on a Saturday and Sunday was was quite the scene.
- 17:13And, it's really it kinda resparked the love of music in me because at the time leading up to
- 17:19that, I wasn't necessarily making great choices in my life.
- 17:22And I wasn't, I wasn't doing what I was put here to do.
- 17:25Right?
- 17:26So it was an amazing time of my life.
- 17:28I hope to do a lot more international traveling.
- 17:30I've visited a lot of the country, and similar to you, that my parents took us on trips all
- 17:36the time.
- 17:37You know, I remember vividly all the trips we took.
- 17:39What we grew up in Chicago until I was about 10.
- 17:42Both my parents from the South Suburbs.
- 17:44So we would take trips to the East Coast when I was younger, did the Eastern Seaboard, you
- 17:48know, both north and kinda south.
- 17:50My dad went to school in Tennessee, so we took a yearly trip down to, you know, the Blue Ridge
- 17:55Mountains and and visited there.
- 17:56And the furthest west we had made it, we'd gone out to Washington one time, but we moved to
- 18:01South Dakota when I was a kid and lived there.
- 18:04So a lot of trips, you know, west from that point and going, you know, into the Tetons and
- 18:09the mountains.
- 18:10And most of our vacations were in that.
- 18:12In my twenties, I started you know, I I read Jack Kerouac's on the road at 18 years old.
- 18:17I was like, wait a minute.
- 18:19Wait a minute.
- 18:19Like, I can either sit in this college in freezing cold South Dakota or I can just, like,
- 18:24throw my guitar on my back, stick a thumb out, and go tour the West Coast.
- 18:27Now granted, nineteen fifties, sixties, America looked a lot different than, you know, the late
- 18:33odds, but it it was still that the courage that it gave me to, like, oh, I can just, like I can
- 18:38go do that.
- 18:39And then you get out and you build that confidence where you're like, no.
- 18:42I don't even need a car.
- 18:43I didn't have a car the entire time I was out there.
- 18:45And I literally went to the place I wanted to.
- 18:47I'm probably braver than I should be, Carrie, to be perfectly honest.
- 18:51I I think it's gotten me into a little bit of, you know, trouble, probably put me in some
- 18:57precarious situations.
- 18:59But also why I'm so confident in, you know, I'm planning a national tour right now where I'm
- 19:03not just taking myself out, but I'm taking out these other bands and these other people and to
- 19:08say, look.
- 19:08We're gonna be okay.
- 19:09Right?
- 19:10Like, I promise you.
- 19:11I've done this before.
- 19:12You know?
- 19:12And if I can go around the country in my suburban driving, sleeping in rest areas, and
- 19:17traveling in that fashion, then I think if we have the security of a tour bus, we're gonna be
- 19:22alright.
- 19:23So it's really built.
- 19:25And now for me, I think this is the next twenty years of my life.
- 19:28Right?
- 19:28It's taking out
- 19:29That sounds super exciting.
- 19:31I I need it.
- 19:32I need that excitement because I live in a tiny little town in the middle of South Dakota, and
- 19:36most of my life can be very, you know, just kinda mundane.
- 19:39Right?
- 19:39And we love our small town.
- 19:41I don't want to live anywhere else.
- 19:42I've lived in major metro areas.
- 19:44I absolutely despise it, but I like to visit them.
- 19:47Right?
- 19:47I like to Yes.
- 19:48Go I I like to go and visit for a few days at a time.
- 19:52And, you know, once I get stuck in traffic once, I'm pretty much like, alright.
- 19:56I'm over it.
- 19:57You know?
- 19:58So but I love helping the transit.
- 20:02What you were talking about, you know, being from a small town and then you go out and you
- 20:06see you know, that's very much what Ms.
- 20:08World Traveler does.
- 20:10I am not a digital nomad.
- 20:12I'm not living abroad.
- 20:13I have a home.
- 20:14I have responsibilities.
- 20:16I have my church.
- 20:16I have my friends and family.
- 20:18You know, I I want to have a home base.
- 20:21I love to go out and have the adventure and then come back to my home base and refresh, you
- 20:28know, reenergize, you know, take care of responsibilities, and then I'm ready to go back
- 20:32out again.
- 20:33So I get totally what you're talking about, that that adventure, there's a time and a place
- 20:39for it, but then you also need that sense of, let me fill my tank back up.
- 20:44You know, let let me get back center recenter myself, and then I'm ready to go again.
- 20:49Right.
- 20:49Well, because it's necessary.
- 20:52You people I don't know you know, people who haven't traveled, which my wife and her family
- 20:56are very like, they vacation.
- 20:58They drive 30 miles down the road to the river, and, like, that's their vacation.
- 21:01Right?
- 21:01Mom and dad haven't really they, you know, they still talk about the one trip they've ever
- 21:05really taken, you know, on a plane going to Vegas in in the nineties sometime.
- 21:10Right?
- 21:10And I'm like, you could travel a little bit more than that.
- 21:13Right?
- 21:14Take a little bit of a vacation.
- 21:15It's okay.
- 21:16But they they're farmers.
- 21:17Right?
- 21:17Dad has a farm and has responsibilities at home that that was just the rhythm of their life.
- 21:22But but now that they're kinda getting towards the end and dad's a little bit older, suffered
- 21:27a major injury last year as well that I think kinda flashed, you know, before his eyes that
- 21:32he's not the young man that he used to be, and they're definitely towards, you know, the end
- 21:37of that, you know, that hourglass than at the beginning that the time is now to if if you
- 21:41wanna go do things, you're you have, like, the next five to ten years before you're too old to
- 21:46do any of it.
- 21:47Right?
- 21:48So get out and enjoy life
- 21:49a little bit.
- 21:49Time is precious now.
- 21:50Yeah.
- 21:51Well, yeah, he broke his leg really bad, I mean, to the point where we thought, you know,
- 21:55amputation was on the table at one point.
- 21:57Now fully healed and kinda back to it, but realizing that you're not gonna be bouncing
- 22:02around like you did for the last thirty years running this farm and doing all those things.
- 22:06Right?
- 22:06Like, it's okay to slow down.
- 22:08It's okay to, you know, take a vacation and and get out and go go spend a week somewhere else
- 22:14out of the state.
- 22:15Like, we can feed the dog.
- 22:16You don't have you know?
- 22:17We can take care of a few animals, and not everything has to be done right now.
- 22:22So I hope that I'm able to start to provide a a little bit of that in our own way.
- 22:28Right?
- 22:28That we can grow in our business and to provide that.
- 22:32You know, one thing that set me away from the job that I was working too was that was kinda
- 22:36I'm always gonna be capped by that income.
- 22:38I was never there was no getting above what I was making, and what I was making Right.
- 22:42Was barely enough to give me the life that I wanted to live.
- 22:45I couldn't afford three, four major vacations a year like I want to do.
- 22:50So I had to find, you know, a way to not just make that money, but to build my world around
- 22:56doing that so that those, you know, the things that I like to do are almost paid for by the
- 23:00business that I don't need to go spend the money that I'm making to do that.
- 23:04And I feel like you kind of encapsulate that a little bit as well that you've built this brand
- 23:10around the thing that you love to do.
- 23:12Absolutely.
- 23:14Absolutely.
- 23:14And, you know, it's it's not a moneymaker, but it's a it fills my heart, fills my soul, feeds
- 23:24my spirit.
- 23:26And those things are so valuable that it doesn't really matter.
- 23:32You know, I I worked.
- 23:34I saved.
- 23:35You know, I have a nest egg, so I'm okay.
- 23:38And now I can take the time to do something that I love to do that, again, just feeds my
- 23:44soul.
- 23:45Well and you see that light.
- 23:48Right?
- 23:48Like, you see your that a a lot of people, you know, that are in the the you know, I don't
- 23:53wanna say the twilight of their lives, but are further closer to the end than to the
- 23:57beginning.
- 23:58Right, that they don't have this light that you have.
- 24:00And would you say that, you know, doing something that you love, I mean, it has to feel
- 24:05like it's extending your life beyond maybe what it would have been had you just stayed
- 24:10committed by just making money and and doing that.
- 24:13Absolutely.
- 24:14Absolutely.
- 24:14You know, when I was a young girl, I used to picture when people were retired that they
- 24:18would sit on a porch in a rocking chair and, you know, and, like, look, you know, look like
- 24:2595 years old.
- 24:26Well, people to retire at 65.
- 24:29You know?
- 24:29There's a lot of life left.
- 24:32So that picture that I had was was really quite ridiculous.
- 24:37You know, I I'm very near retirement age, and I wake up energized every day, love what I do.
- 24:45Retirement is nowhere near in my future.
- 24:48I'm gonna do it until my body gives out or I just have to slow down or, you know, whatever
- 24:54it is.
- 24:54But I love it so much that I think that's what keeps people young.
- 24:58You know, the the for lessons, the joy of life
- 25:01that Exactly.
- 25:02Yeah.
- 25:03That that spice of life that keeps us going.
- 25:06And, yeah, you give me so much motivation to keep doing exactly what I'm doing because I do
- 25:10I get a lot of people that comment on me, you know, when I mentioned I'm almost further.
- 25:13Like, I did not assume that about you.
- 25:15Like, you still have so much to to so much energy all the time.
- 25:18And it's like, well, because I'm very passionate about what I do every day.
- 25:23You know?
- 25:23And I could see that I wasn't I I've always been this inside, but outwardly, I wasn't this
- 25:30even two, three years ago just kind of stuck in this factory not really seeing not seeing a
- 25:38future that I really wanted to be a part of.
- 25:40And now everything has changed so drastically, and you give me so much more courage to keep
- 25:46doing what we're doing to chase that because the same as you.
- 25:49I don't like you know, I didn't I didn't start working until I was in my thirties, so I don't
- 25:53have a retirement nest egg to lean on anyway.
- 25:56So I'm if I'm gonna be working till I'm 75 or 80 years old, then I might as well be doing
- 26:00something that I enjoy doing.
- 26:02Something that you love.
- 26:03Absolutely.
- 26:04Well Gives you joy, but also gives you energy.
- 26:06Exactly.
- 26:07Well, Carrie, where can everybody find you and follow you and and find your channel and
- 26:13everything?
- 26:14Go ahead and plug it
- 26:15love to have people come along for the for the ride.
- 26:17So we're on YouTube.
- 26:19News World Traveler is a it's a YouTube series, and we go all over the world.
- 26:25And it's a little bit different than what other people are doing.
- 26:28You know, we focus a little bit more on style, fashion, art, design, culture, history, that
- 26:34sort of thing.
- 26:34So there's not a lot of, you know, where should you eat, where should you stay, there's
- 26:39thousands of people out there doing that.
- 26:41So come along for the ride because you'll see something and hear something different, and
- 26:45that's, at YouTube, Ms.
- 26:47World Traveler, m s, Ms.
- 26:49World Traveler.
- 26:50We're also on Instagram, Kerry, Ms.
- 26:52World Traveler.
- 26:53That's k e r r y, Kerry, Ms.
- 26:55World Traveler.
- 26:56Girls up, Ms.
- 26:58World Traveler.
- 26:59Fantastic.
- 27:00Well, Carrie, thank you so much for spending some time with me today.
- 27:03This was a lovely conversation.
- 27:05I will be following the YouTube channel because that sounds like some amazing content that I
- 27:09would be, absolutely in love with watching on a regular basis.
- 27:12So thank you for being part of the show today, and thank you for being part of the scene.
- 27:17You're welcome.