A new year is usually filled with resolutions, and mine often contradict one another. Save more money, but travel to new places. Start a more disciplined workout routine, but take more time to rest. Eat healthier, but also enjoy life’s most delicious pleasures. My goals end up clashing, and I’m left debating who I am trying to become—and what actually matters.
Home for the holidays. Nostalgia curling around you like steam from a mug, snow-slicked streets, a tree hung with ornaments you once made with glue-sticky fingers, warm cable-knit sweaters, fireside conversations with the people who raised you.
Traveling is a lot of things. It’s liberating — you are no longer confined by the self and circumstances of your everyday life. It can be affirming and meaningful, revealing parts of yourself you might never encounter in your regular world.
Austin is a special place. In general, yes—but especially to me. It was my first landing after leaving Michigan, my introduction to life outside the mitten. And it was spectacular.
Perched high above the Amalfi Coast, Ravello is a hilltop jewel – without a beach, a little harder to reach than its seaside neighbors, and long adored by golden-age movie stars who knew how to escape the crowds.
On the Amalfi Coast, there’s a small town called Minori. It’s the kind of place that’s easy to miss – a blink-and-you’re-past-it sort of town. And our stay there was completely accidental.
We recently found ourselves back on the road to New Orleans – a long weekend trip was just what two burned-out adults and one six-year-old, who couldn’t believe school was still going on, needed. Five hours in the car passed a little quicker with good conversation, great podcasts and our favorite tunes. And just like that, we were back in the Big Easy.
I tend to associate “beach people” with sand. They love the feeling of it between their toes, the wildness (or calm, depending on the day) of the sea or ocean waves. They’re drawn to that return-to-nature element of the beach trip. There’s a childlike wonder to it all; a nostalgia for our younger selves, maybe even for another time entirely, when people lived by the water, on the water, because of the water – that ancient, instinctive pull of the sea and waterways that shaped civilization as we know it.
One of the best parts of any trip, for me, is reading. Honestly, I think reading is one of the greatest joys of life; but there’s something especially magical about a book by the water. It’s one of those top-tier experiences.
When I was growing up, my family didn’t do Spring Break. We didn’t travel or go anywhere special. My parents worked, and if anything, Spring Break was more of a hassle. It meant finding me a babysitter, or as I got older, making sure I stayed out of trouble – though I wasn’t much for that. While other families were heading to Florida, South Padre Island, Myrtle Beach or Los Angeles, I was at home, reading a book or hanging out with neighbor kids whose families didn’t go anywhere, either. Those years without Spring Break shaped my desire as an adult to go on adventures as if my life depended on it.
