Your mind wanders in a different, more honest way when you are separated from the daily tasks and distractions of working life. Perhaps this mental wander provides a more honest depiction of who you really are, and not just what you are occupied with at the moment. Maybe the distance created by travel instigates a mental longing to familiarity and connecting with your roots. Although I’ve lived states away from my family for several years now, the miles seemed...

Lane and I travel in a style we call “opportunistic travel”. By “opportunistic”, I mean that we generally don’t pre-plan too much while we travel. We’ll have a rough idea of where we want to go and what we might want to see, but ask us for specifics before we leave and we’ll shrug our shoulders. We generally book a hotel or an Airbnb no more than a week before and, more often, the day or so...

Welcome to Querétaro—a colorful city where every baby is the cutest baby, there is never a wrong time to eat ice cream, and you may lose count of sweater-wearing chihuahuas you see while you walk past a clown show. Seriously. There are clowns everywhere. Clowns have been performing on the streets of Querétaro for over 300 years, at least that what we heard from one of the red-nosed performers. Consider that 300 years is older than our country and...

We walked into our first day of Spanish language school not knowing what to expect. We sat down in narrow desks, waiting for our first instructor. With her long hair pulled back, she smiled kindly at us. I would later learn she was the age of my youngest sister. With that, we opened our books and began class. For the next hour, not a word in English was spoken. We reviewed basic concepts in Spanish; letters, numbers, nationalies, food. All...