It’s been over three years since I made my last post. There has been some traveling on the road since that time, and I’ve had a good time. Life provides choices, and if we pay attention to the people around us, listen to our moral compass, act with compassion and try our best to do what’s right, the path is generally clear.

Sometimes this means that we can’t do everything we think we want. Sometimes things change and we become incapable of doing what we were accustomed to do. One of the things I miss most about chronicling our travels is the edge the essay puts on the memories of our adventures. We have met people who touched our lives, and without the details in these essays they slowly turn to memory shadows and don’t remain the brilliant, interesting, complicated wonderful people we met. The essays re-animate them for me.

Then there are the places we’ve been. Many have been stops along the way, but that does not make them any the less beautiful or interesting. It’s pleasurable to look back and remember a place that would otherwise be forgotten. I always maintained to my men that “If it ‘aint writ down, it never happened.”. Time smoothes our memory and smudges the details. I miss the places I haven’t written about because I know I don’t remember them with the clarity they deserve.

Louise, my sweetheart, can no longer travel with me. She is ill, and in the care of others who take beautiful care of her; better care than I could hope to manage. I see her most every day, but over time I’ve realized that it’s OK for me to travel, enjoy the places and people I meet, and have fun. I go alone occasionally and meet friends at destinations, or travel with friends, my daughter Kitt, or a combination of extended family and friends at destinations.

I hope you enjoy the places I intend to write about, and I certainly look upon travel as an adventure spiced with great people and unusual things. Here’s to a new start and new adventures.