I write from an impossibly beautiful deck looking over an impossibly beautiful backyard pool, distracted by an impossibly beautiful mountain sunset to my right. I’m in Colorado, about ten minutes from where I currently call home. I’ve been dog-sitting this weekend and enjoying a weekend-away-from-home with JT and three of the biggest dogs I’ve ever taken care of. It’s been a blast.

I apparently have, once again, let quite a span sneak by without writing. I moved to the southern suburbs of Denver in November 2022 and have, since that time, done a fair amount of running around. However, unlike a lot of my last couple years of running around, I had a room with my stuff already in it to come back to. That was a welcome change.

Christmas 2022 happened in Chicago with family, complete with road trip between Denver and Chicago in some of the worst weather JT and I have ever driven in. A flight to Seattle in January, to briefly visit and then drive T’s car back to Denver, made for the second time JT and I driven that route in three months. And then after a whopping six or so weeks in one place, I hit the road again to drive Denver to Chicago (there were decently good reasons for all of this cross-country driving, I promise) at the end of February. That was the beginning of my most recent, most major whirlwind of 2023 so far.

To save a bit of time, here’s the rest of that trip in bullets:

1. Spent a few days in Chicago and Milwaukee to celebrate family birthdays, see the VEs’ new house, catch C on his way across the country, and see Mom’s CYT show.
2. Drove to Nashville, Tennessee and back for the weekend to celebrate a very dear friend’s marriage.
3. Flew to Mexico City, MX the next morning for a week of running sport coach training seminars, which was a very cool experience.
4. Flew to Puerto Vallarta, MX for three quick days to crash the beginning of my parents’ and the VEs’ vacation together.
5. Flew to Dublin, Ireland on the morning of St. Patrick’s Day to meet JT, two long-time friends of hers, and their partners for a couple days and do a proper St. Patty’s Day celebration.
6. Flew to Edinburgh, Scotland with JT to visit friends and hold a few work meetings for Fathom. Between Edinburgh and driving up to Aberdeen and back (five hours northeast through the Scottish highlands), we were in Scotland for three nights.
7. Flew to Belfast, Northern Ireland with JT for about twenty hours to see dear friends and our dear city.
8. Flew with JT to Los Angeles, California for the weekend to celebrate her brother’s wedding.
9. Drove from LA back up to Denver in two days.

It was definitely a whirlwind. It was over four weeks of travel when all was said and done. It was a boatload of new experiences, new people, old friends, and resurrected memories.

And it had an end date. That was new.

Now back to my blooming spring of a Colorado life, complete with potted plants and regular hangouts and good groups of people. It’s nice to come back somewhere.

-LS