Once we started traveling, we began to see firsthand what it looked like to live out our dreams. Through beginning our shared life in such a foreign context, we began to challenge our assumptions that life would move fixedly and predictably from one stage to the next. We began to develop instead a growth-oriented mindset of creating whatever future we wanted.
3 a.m., November 14, 2015. A suburb of Paris. A piercing sound jolts me awake. It’s dark, and too early for an alarm. What is that sound? Groping around in the dark with 3 a.m. cognitive capacity, I finally find Stephen’s wailing phone. “What the…” A device locator alarm has been activated. Turning it off, … Continue reading Remembering Paris, A Year Later
Dear Reader, Following nearly two months away I am now home. Home in a quiet room of a colorful cabin bathed in November’s low-hanging sunlight and fenced in by thickets of birch and pine. After the maniacal streets of Kathmandu I can’t imagine anywhere more dissimilar to find myself. The clean air and deep … Continue reading Welcome Home
Dear Reader, I spent years anticipating this time. Somehow, so seamlessly it escaped my notice, the minutes became hours, which formed a day, and enough of those passed where I started calling them weeks and then months. And two months has now brought me to my penultimate day in Stirling. Sometimes beginnings, endings, and milestones … Continue reading A Separate Life
Dear Reader, This last weekend I caught a train from the rugged hills of Scotland to bustling streets of London, England. London’s influence seems to permeate the world and the imaginations of even those who have never set foot in it. Images of red telephone boxes, waving Union Jack, and double-decker busses zooming past iconic … Continue reading London
Dear Reader, It is raining hard here in Scotland, and I thought I would take advantage of this stormy afternoon to wander back onto WordPress. I have been in Europe forty days now, and I want to thank you so much for sticking with me so far during this amazing time. I find myself now … Continue reading Time in Glencoe
Dear Reader, This Thursday past, my journey brought me to the city of Glasgow, the largest city in Scotland. Buzzing with fast-paced life, Glasgow has to be one of the most underrated cities in Europe. It doesn’t share the same noble past or historic attraction as its neighbor, Edinburgh, but brings the rehabilitated energy of … Continue reading Glasgow
Dear Reader, As my lovely and faithful companion—more commonly known as a journal—tells me, it is day nineteen of the journey, and life has settled into a regular rhythm. That is, if you can call daily activities like climbing mountains and exploring dungeons regular. I think it is a lifestyle that I can get used … Continue reading Light
Dear Reader, Here is how I describe to you what Scotland sounds like to me. “Hi! What’s your name?” The sticky air of the castle hums with the sound of building friendships. A hundred and fifteen students mill about the great room, chatting eagerly—or is it desperately?—over glasses of wine. I smile, second-guessing my choice … Continue reading Sounds of Scotland
Dear Reader, While I have a myriad of tales I could relay to you about my day in Belgium or these first few days in the shining city of Stirling, Scotland, I wanted to take a moment to focus on why I made the decision that I did to pack up and spend the entire … Continue reading Tide Pools