Here you can find everything about my travels! Recounts of my adventures, thoughts on my European destinations, and poems inspired by the scenery and my experiences are all articulated in the posts below.
About a Dream.
As the sun sets, or rather moves, from above my six-month stint in the heart of Brittany, France, my mind bounces back to my first weeks here. Everything touched with that light sting of newness and unfamiliarity has now become cradled into the buzz of homey comfort, like a hug hovering just around my limbs.…
A Small Meditation on Love and Hate
in light of Bell Hooks’ novel All About Love Love feels so easy when you have it, yet this same virtue can feel like a writer’s block freestyle, a spotlight on your stuttering vacuity when you don’t. That frustration sweating your brows as you try to press happiness into your forehead. There is no one…
Americans in Brittany
What are you meant to expect at the crux of two selves? The hardworking daughter my parents know in America plunged into a French world that has been the 6-month payoff of all those years they witnessed. I expected a hang-up, a glitch, or a code-switching snag, but as they stepped forth into the world…
What Do You Stand For?
The Brittany rain fell hard, soaking darker spots in my sweater and twisting my hair into tendrils that wound around each other in heavy locks. The air still sat comfortably against my skin at 54º, and the wet was not a big enough deterrent for the human sea that swallowed Rennes’ Charles De Gaulle metro…
Back in Brittany: a musing of my mind
It is humbling to stand among a sea of passports. I see Malaysia, China, Italy, the United Kingdom. Across the way, a few French Bordeaux-red books line up for preboarding while the Spanish woman next to me asks which group has been called. My American blue book feels so small between my fingers, the whole…
Crochet Creations
Since boarding my first flight to Munich at the start of the European adventure that would become my life, I have kept busy with one of my more geriatric hobbies. Crochet. I dwindled the hours over the Atlantic and chugged over train tracks in these weaves of colors. What started as a pastime has evolved…
Graffiti and Concrete
The Summer of 2021 found me tanned and studious, legs propping up my laptop by the pool, screen open to a remote class on the history and artistry of graffiti while I let the Grecian sun polarize through my sunglasses. It should have been irritating, being made to study during an astonishing vacation, the first…
Searching
An endless stream of resumes and cover letters and company values. A million different words for teamwork. In my sleep, I mumble introductions and elevator pitches. Each time pen hits page it’s “since graduation…” and another unprolific declaration of my love for crafting experiences with words. The worst of all of this is the fact…
A Day in the Life
The morning birds sing sweetly into four ears, their owners my charge and me, listening together with two words to describe the artists. I say bird, and Victoire says oisseau, but we both agree that we love their sound. “J’adore le chanson de la matin.” Her tiny legs wrap around my waist as she takes…
Thoughts Over the Atlantic
Here I am, post-Christmas, post-New Years, post-America. All over again. The complimentary Cabernet Sauvignon bitterly minces with the dry American Airlines pretzels that are currently clinging to my gums. Dégoûtant- Je sais. I am always so ambitious on airplanes. I am going to write a blog post, finish my french workbook, crochet a sweater or…
A tout a l’heure: Nuit à Paris
C’est le dernier jour de mon grand voyage depuis que j’ai tout laissé derrière moi. Je suis tellement heureux que cela ait été possible et je suis toujours excité pour mon retour à Rennes dans la nouvelle année. Ces derniers mois, j’étais en Allemagne, en Autriche et évidemment en France. J’ai appris le français au…
Marche De Noel
The crowds swallow the street in tufted beanies and wound scarves, hands plunging deep in puffer pockets while chins tuck into the wrap of their necks. It is cold, but there are presents to purchase. Wooden stands make two wide isles in front of the white-painted Ferris Wheel and mingle pottery and jewelry with sugar-stuffed…
Cesson Saturday Marche
and the beauty of saying goodbye. No Feelings Involved. As soon as it touches my tips I’d do anything for it. Just another wisp of that feeling. Not feeling- that flavor of feeling. The nudging more unfurling blank white maps under the nearest pen. That embrace, embrace me, push more of that cyclical urge give…
Walking the Line
Not unlike Johnny Cash, as he sings, “ I keep the ends out for the tie that binds… I walk the line,” I walk this tightrope without slack. I’ve already cranked the dial, bit by bit, consuming everything untaught in the years of weeknight poetry groups and the tight art circles of strangers. Hung low…
Courting Cambridge
I am running. Face twisted with concern, yet with each step the muscles find slack. I thank the border control woman in every language I know. I showed her my train ticket fifteen minutes ago, and without her kind decision, I would still be standing deep in the inching queue, sweating inside instead of out.…
Meg, Margot, and St. Michel
I think about Maleficent’s thorny throne, Phillip chopping through hardened stems, severing rose bud necks, and drawing shallow red rivulets over his cheek, but as we conquer these steep steps, it is clear that here, the vines are nuns and monks, rose buds are stone busts, and their thorns are Christian judgment. Le Mont St.…
Living in Le Douillet
All noise disappears as we find our way out of Rennes and into the simple fields of the Normandy countryside. My new friend, Megan, her girlfriend Margot, and I rode as passengers in the back of a small gray sedan dubbed Cleo. Our tightly packed car wound down these dirt roads and up the slightly…
Looking Like Rennes
Steve Lacy sings “Bad Habit” to me as I wait at the Cesson bus stop to board my near-daily bus to the center of town. My eyes dart from this page frequently, expecting the C6 Aeroport to be in view. I can’t tell if they are always late or all early, but the bus always…
Reflections on Midnights
A review of Taylor Swift’s latest album. With twenty songs, Taylor over-delivered on her promise of thirteen new tracks dropping on the 20th of October. Midnights, and the extended 3 AM tracks, is one of those albums that takes a few subsequent listens before the full impact of her words hit you. Like all of…
Iced Coffee Escapades pt.2: Cafe Glace S’il Vous Plaît
If you have been following my blog, you know that for me, iced coffee is a must. You have likely read my rants about its scarcity in Europe, and if this is true, then it will be no surprise that I am back with another edition of Iced Coffee Escapades, this time in Rennes. Mokka…
Sainte Anne Social
A metro station between a chapel and a carousel, and the central meeting point for a night out or an afternoon in the sun. The station entrance is populated by clusters of people I can only compare to the unhoused hippies of San Francisco. They pass cigarettes, share toothy grins, and I feel nothing but…
St. Malo Saturday
“Want company?” Of course I did. What better way to explore the small beach town than with friends who knew their way around? “Yes!” I told my cluster of new friends, and less than 24 hours later, we were riding, five bodies in a small sedan, on our way to St. Malo. The hour drive…
I Love Ireland
Not because I’ve ever been or seen what the country has to offer besides what can be gleaned from the closed captions of Netflix’s “Derry Girls,” but for the simple fact that Irish pubs offer a happy break for English within any large city. Here in Rennes, there are many, though I’ve only been to…
Purge
There is something stopping me. A cork lodged sideways in Sauvignon, I feel like I am eighteen again, prying that pressed bark from dark glass with a fork. Using every object but the real thing to remove the blockage. Like my young hands leveraging the fork, I try to find substitutes. Yoga in the morning,…
Cesson-Sevigne Break into Reality
It has been less than five days since I arrived in my new home, Cesson-Sevigne, a quiet town nestled just outside the larger metropolis of Rennes. I can already feel the loving sprouts of familiarity winding, filling the space between me and its local virtues. Its morning smell of bread and butter, the quiet rustle…
Chambery Charm
Though my reason for this morning trip to Chambery is far from ideal, as I sip my Cafe Glace, I can feel my bones loosen as the city’s charm works its magic on me. So much empty space reaches its body from market to market, from boutique to cafe. Ancient cobblestone polished by the tracks…
Camping at Detente et Clapotis
Violet petals lay delicate betwixt my fingers as I weave stems through each other. Birds sing their presence over the lake that laps like a tired tongue over pebbles, smooth with the softness that only comes from years of kissing the same water. Boats row gently over this blue pool and circle each other in…
Château de Menthon St. Bernard
Green- it’s everywhere, surrounding the harsh stone cliffs and lapping at the castle’s feet. Red roofed towers point their sharp skulls through the fog and break the rolling air, cascading across rocked edges. It is easy to see why this Chateau was the inspiration for Disney’s Sleeping Beauty. Red paneled windows and painted roofs send…
For the Love of Annecy
Welcome to Annecy, a village as tranquil as its name. With an abundance of natural beauty paired with an overwhelming share of local history, Annecy stands as the perfect embodiment of French serenity. The leaves whisper age-old secrets under the shade of the Chapeau de Napoleon mountain as a collection of boats draw arrows across…
Viennese Fashion Week
Let’s start with a bit of honesty. Vienna is not my favorite. The streets are beautiful but slow and quiet, where I am fast and loud. Too American, not out of pride but of speed, finding the fastest route through the crowd and passing pedestrians with each stride. I hover my two suitcases a few…
Johann Chrysostom Wolfgang Theophilus Mozart
A name too long to capture the simple beauty of his music. Ears open and facing the open Opera, I took it in. Horns vibrating from lips pursed and pressed to the narrow end. Strings shuddering with the touch of bow hair. Precision in the procession of Mozart’s music. Dressed in wigs and white ankles,…
Austrian First Impressions
The new apartment has a bath. This detail initially shrugged off, has become a luxury. And I am grateful for the simple pleasure of a steaming tub. Perched in the attic of a red-toned apartment building, my white windows stick their noses to the street. The sill- wide enough to hold my body- does, as…
Breaking In Berlin
Clubbing in Berlin, a notorious night out. Black is Berlin’s heaviest color, draping over the scraped sky and open on bright thighs. This contrast the color code for an open door. Police of fashion, attitude, and attraction guard the thumping black behind them. A quick blink and you’ve been checked out, faster than gum at…
€1 Sundays pt. 3: Bayerisches National Museum
Of my triad of €1 museums, the Bayerisches National Museum holds the greatest amount of intrigue and history by far. At 167 years old, not only does this composite collection’s own history supersede that of its current colleagues, but stands as one of the sole representations of Bavarian history from its own perspective. Its story…
€1 Sundays pt. 2: Alte Pinakothek
Trading modern for masters, I left the Pinakothek der Moderne for the Alte Pinakothek. Paneled windows and tan stone replaced the overwhelming white of my first destination. The renaissance revival architecture a clear indication of the museum’s contrast collection. Founded in 1836 by Ludwig I of Bavaria, the Alte Pinakothek houses one of the oldest…
€1 Sundays pt. 1: Pinakothek Der Moderne
On Sundays, some of Munich’s best museums are open to the public for only €1. Locals and tourists alike pour through their open doors, starting their week with the wonder of great master paintings, modern models, and Bavarian history. I started my day with the Pinakothek Der Moderne. The spherical tin spaceship by the entrance…
Garmisch’s Fest!
Oktoberfest! Germany’s international trademark and treasure. Let me stop you before you remind me it’s only August. Something as small as the month doesn’t stop the Germans. As the Summer circles into Autumn, each Bavarian town hosts its own fest. The tradition a traveling prelude to Oktober’s main event in Munich and Germany’s larger cities.…
Escape to Eibsee
In that sweet space, those first inches warmed by the sun’s stare, I float. Back flat against the cooler depths and the fish that dart below. Head amid my own flourish of sunlight, I close my eyes and listen. Much like my afternoon at Starnberger See, my ears cling to the flutter of birds and…
A Day Trip To Starnberger See
Loving. This word writes itself in a cursive flourish across my mind as the water’s swell pulls my body up and down. Rocking me as if a baby in loving arms into a serene dream. The waves lap at the gentle shore, softly. Quieter still is the breeze, whistling through leaves and the beaks of…
Iced Coffee Escapades pt. 1
Einen Icekaffee bitte? *insert a poorly mimed pouring motion* Eight times out of ten, this question is met with a sharp “nein” and a sympathetically confused smile. As for the other two, the answer is, “ja! Ice cappuccino?” As a barista (in America at least), ordering an iced cappuccino proves you know nothing about coffee.…
The Beginnings of a Munich Love-Affair
If Berlin is New York City, then Munich is Chicago. Straddling the heavy traffic of tourism, business, and university youth with abundant nature, authentic culture, and neighborly warmth, Munich is truly the beating heart of German Bavaria. As an American girl with German heritage, fitting in is easy… as long as I don’t open my…
Nomadic Thread 