While growing up, my parents and I would take road trips to the various, and seemingly random, corners of the country.

When I was just a few years old, we packed up and moved from Cheyenne, Wyoming, to Tampa, Florida, where I spent the majority of my childhood; and with Tampa as our base, we took several trips ranging from weekends in Tennessee to traversing the Blue Ridge Parkway up the east coast to Pennsylvania and crossing into New England via Massachusetts.

These trips were all done by car (or minivan), at a time when expensive gas pushed the 90 cent mark in many parts of the country.

Traveling by car as much as we did at such a young age instilled in me an affinity for exploring the various stretches of road that extend along and well beyond the interstate highway system. But perhaps more importantly, driving thousands of miles as a child cemented my love of cars and of driving, and it shaped my worldview as I explored the many subcultures that dotted the United States.

By the time I could drive alone, I’d visited over half of the states in the US, and at 16, I promised myself to visit every state before I turned 21. But at 18, two pockets of the country remained untouched by my eyes and feet, and I surrendered my car when I moved away for school, limiting myself to the mass transit options of Washington, DC. Those regions remained destined for later exploration, but my desire to complete the task persevered.

Reaching those first 40 states was simple. My parents divorced when I turned 12, and from that moment on, I split my summers between Colorado with my father, and Massachusetts with my maternal grandparents. Road trips from these hubs brought me to every state in New England in an passing afternoon or led to week-long excursions to California or Yellowstone National Park from Denver. We didn’t stay at fancy hotels or resorts, and the trips were made via buses or in aged cars with just enough stamina to survive the duration of the trip we were on.

These trips were the opposite of how I assumed my peers–the kids I grew up with–spent their summers. I returned to school to overhear stories of weeks at the beach or time spent at Bible camp or entire summers of riding roller coasters and watersides while lounging around the various theme parks in Florida. Meanwhile, I found it difficult to explain how I was sent off to visit family in my two adoptive homes of Colorado and Massachusetts, but I attempted to explain my adventures, regardless of the lack of interest.

The understanding was mostly lost to my peers, but my sense of adventure and desire to explore only grew with each trip.

I quickly fell in love with the Northeast–a place my mother left as soon as she could, but which was filled with a rich and vibrant culture, unlike anywhere else in the United States. History and the speed of metropolitan life combined with theater, arts, and architecture in New York, Boston, and Philadelphia, and I knew from a young age that I needed to live in a big city one day. The Northeast fascinated me, but the Rocky Mountains and my travels to California and the Pacific Northwest were by far the greatest excursions I’ve made.

Dozens of dramatic features consumed the landscape at every western horizon, and while the east coast’s artistic and historic culture was astonishing, the artificial landscape could not compare to the natural features found as I traveled westward.

I turned 21 years old, and still without a car, I was unable to visit the few states left on my list. The remaining pockets of uncharted territory were lumped into states severed by a road trip loop my father and I made between Tampa and Denver, where he eventually moved. These states included Oklahoma and Arkansas within the loop; North and South Dakota, Minnesota, Iowa, Indiana, Ohio, and Michigan to the north and east; and a single outlier–Oregon.

From 18 to 22, I’d spent months in California for various job and school-related training and events, weeks in the Pacific Northwest and Hawaii, taken several trips to Vegas, and I’d driven through the sparsely-populated regions of the Four Corners alone; but the pockets weren’t shrinking.

Then, at 23, I purchased my second car, and my goal was within sight again. I told myself that I would visit the remaining nine states before my 25th birthday, and I began plotting out my course.

First, I would grab a friend in New York City, and we would take a trip to Maine. I wasn’t quite sure how much of Maine and Rhode Island I remembered from my childhood, but I felt it would only be fair to touch base with the states if I were to include them in my official tally.

Once home from that trip, we began planning a Thanksgiving trip, but this time we would go through North Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky, Indiana, Ohio, West Virginia and Pennsylvania–I giant loop that would knock my list down to just eight.

Next, I would drive home to Tampa for Christmas, but my path would be anything but direct. After visiting a friend in Darlington, South Carolina, I headed west, toward Memphis, TN. After visiting a few blues bars and Graceland–and eating BBQ, of course–I passed into Arkansas for the first time. Here, I skipped quickly through Little Rock and spent a few hours in Hot Springs, home to the smallest and most unique National Parks.

Perhaps it was the low bar I set for Arkansas, but the state surprised me in its beauty. Though the landscape became incredibly dark after sunset, and I drove to Oklahoma City that evening to knock out another state.

After rolling into Oklahoma City at 1 am, I slept in and wandered around its downtown for a while the following afternoon. Locals told me that the bombing memorial became the center of downtown redevelopment efforts, and I found the city to be very walkable and clean, though it was limited to just a handful of blocks. I visited the stockyards in the city before heading down to Houston, where I met a friend and spent my next night.

Next, I decided to visit New Orleans for the first time as an adult, and after a night out with another local friend, I packed in some gumbo and étouffée and headed down to Tampa.

I was now down to just six states away from my goal, and they became the biggest surprises in my journey.

After leaving my job with a senator’s office on Capitol Hill, I signed up for training for a product called Casper in Chicago. One of my good friends in Chi Town suggested I stay with him, and I floated the idea of a road trip, which he quickly agreed to go on.

The trip took us in a large circle through Wisconsin, Minnesota, North and South Dakota, Nebraska and his home state of Iowa, and I was surprised by the beauty of each state–including Iowa, which I envisioned being flat fields of corn for hundreds of miles. Each state had large rivers and green, rolling hills, and we were pleased with the ample supply of hardy food and fresh beer at every stop.

Upon returning to Chicago, we took a quick day trip to Michigan, which was sufficient enough for my count. I now had just one state left, and it felt further away than ever.

Luckily, I had some airline miles saved up, and I’d recently reconnected with a friend from San Francisco that was excited to go–he’d never been to Portland, himself. So we planned a quick weekend excursion, just two weeks before my 25th birthday.

The excitement of the trip didn’t hit me until I switched planes in Atlanta and handed my ticket to the gate agent for my second flight. The ticket read “ATL to PDX,” and I felt my heart ready to jump out of my throat. I was excited.

I wanted to scream with excitement as we approached the runway in Portland, and I secretly hoped for some sort of announcement over the airplane’s PA system after we landed and I knew my goal was had come to fruition. No one onboard knew, of course, and I wondered if they would shrug me off like my young peers had once done or ask me questions about the places I’d gone. In either case, I was neither in a mood to talk nor was I ready to be disappointed. Instead, I rushed off the airplane and met up with my friend, where we grabbed a celebratory drink (or two) and called it a night.

I’d been everywhere, but at that moment, my hotel room bed was the only place in the world I wanted to be.

I won’t bore you with the details of my adventure in Portland, because beyond exploring waterfalls, driving along the Pacific coast and delighting in the amazing seafood, beer and wine, I left Oregon able to reflect upon my quarter-century accomplishment. I’d accomplished my goal with friends and family that I’d either traveled with or met up with along the way, and while the goal was a feat in itself, the various paths I took in my journey became the most significant accomplishment.