Back on the Road!

We’ve decided to revive this blog! A lot has changed since I last wrote (in case you’re really out of the loop, Roberto and I got married!), and we’re back on the road, so we figured it would be a good way to keep people up to date on our whereabouts, our impressions about the places we visit, upcoming plans, and more. I have a hard enough time keeping up with the other two blogs I’m now writing (here and here), but it’s nice to have a place with no pressure, no need for SEO, no worries about visitor statistics, where I can post updates and share my thoughts. Good practice to get more writing done, too! Roberto will also be posting, so you’ll have a chance to work on your Spanish. :)

We’re in Portland, Oregon, right now, housesitting for my brother and his girlfriend. On Tuesday, we start our epic adventure south to San Diego and back. In a stroke of luck, we’ve managed to score a loaner car for the next few months, and we’re thrilled to have the freedom to go where we want, when we want.

After almost a month in the States, I think we’ve slept in something like eight different beds (more for me, since I went to Vancouver by myself and stayed in two more places!). It’s been great visiting with friends and family in New Jersey, Portland, Seattle, and Vancouver, but we’ve also learned the value of staying put. As usual, it’s all about balance, tempering movement with stillness. We’ll continue to seek that in the coming months (and years), no matter where we are.

We’re in the States until early December, but our plans are more up in the air than ever. We had planned to be on the West Coast until late September, when I was supposed to be back on the East Coast to co-lead a retreat. But the retreat has been canceled (the location fell through), so we’ve suddenly found ourselves a little less sure and a lot more flexible, with no totally concrete plans until Thanksgiving in New Jersey. It’s fun to have a wide-open itinerary, but it’s also rather daunting, especially when we know we don’t want to moving around constantly. All the more reason to find more housesitting gigs and other opportunities to stay in one place for longer. We’ve been invited to visit people all over the country, but the cost in getting to some of those places is a bit of a deterrent, so we’re still figuring it all out.

For now, I’m excited about the road trip, and I can’t wait to see old friends and new, and to show Roberto around San Francisco and other treasured spots in California. It’s going to be a great adventure!

P.S. Our place in Buenos Aires is for rent while we’re gone! If you know anyone interested in a vacation rental, check it out.