I am always interested in hearing travel tips. Having come back to Boulder only this week after a 3 week trip to Italy and France, I find that the traveling isn’t over simply after you walk back through your door and the itinerary has ended. I think that this is my big travel tip. There is something about travel–especially about extended travel–that takes us to the edge (the very tip) of ourselves. I’ve heard that it takes a week to become adjusted to being on vacation and, generally, by then most are over. The adjustments we make with travel are unlike any other. A different space, different accommodations, different creature comforts (limited Internet access!). Once we get past that period of time in which we still feel tightly connected to our “lives back home” the magical door begins to open. We begin to loose track of time, perhaps even the day of the week. Morning drifts to late afternoon. We can begin to abandon regimented habits.

Often travel is thought of as a luxury when the physicality of it all can be far from it. I’m beginning to think that travel is one of the only things that can pull us out of our tightly knit lives and open our eyes to a broader world in a very human way. With small Italian phrases still trying to fall from my lips, I step back into a week of my life in Boulder and remember that the world is a broad place–so much to know, to learn, to dream and do.