Page and Larry have been exploring the world together since their days as high school sweethearts. Page’s family felt the impact of disease when her dad’s mind started to cloud with dementia during the last years’ of his life. Then her mom started to show signs of Alzheimer’s disease. Worried that the same fate might be in store for her, Page took it as a moment of reckoning.
“I think that just really pushed me into saying, okay, we don’t need that much money to go, we can just go now and think about it later,” says Page. “None of us knows how much time we’ve got. And so we keep postponing, trusting that there’s always another day or another year until there isn’t.”
“You have no idea what’s going to come along. If you have until 40, 50 or 90,” says Larry. “I wanted to enjoy life especially after I met Page.”
Page and Larry agreed that they wouldn’t let money—or the lack thereof—hold them back. Instead of waiting for that perfect moment, they got to work. The couple planned and prepared, scrimped and saved so they could be free to travel the world. “We didn’t care what other people thought when we drove a car that was three different colors because it came from the wrecking yard, that was fine with us.”
Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Europe, Tanzania, Panama… the list goes on and on. “It’s just so much more important to experience things than to buy things,” says Page.
Growing up, Page never expected a life filled with adventures in the far reaches of the world. “I’ve got so much in my little brain that I feed off of all the time. I can just think back about climbing Kilimanjaro or running across the Serengeti or trekking in the Amazon and all those other things. They are all things that I did!”
Imagine Life Without Disease: What Would You Do?
“That, to me, is just like, oh, you just can’t wait to see what’s coming kid!”
Every day, scientists at La Jolla Institute for Immunology work toward Life Without Disease. What keeps them going is the promise of empowering people to live the life they want.
For Page and Larry, Life Without Disease means they can keep going wherever adventure leads them. What does Life Without Disease mean for you? Inspire us by sharing your story.
Imagine Life Without Disease: What Would You Do?
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Imagine Life Without Disease: What Would You Do?
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