As the sun set on my New Year’s Eve, I resolved that today would bring the first in a steady barrage of posts that will inspire myself and website visitors in 2016.
Ever since my debut overseas adventure in January 2006, my scattered mind has lived simultaneously in the past, the present, and the future. I constantly want to bask in memories and lessons that are behind me: transferring journal scrawlings to typed articles, sharing hotel and restaurant reviews, uploading scads of photos. I am compelled to tend to day-to-day business at the same time, performing routine website maintenance and clocking in at one of several day jobs. I can’t resist stretching my thoughts forward, imagining the next trip way before I have even ten percent of my previous photos and notes organized. I get but a fraction of the past work finished before I am knee deep in planning the next block of work, the next flight, the next itinerary.
I’ve still got post-its and legal pads from 2006, 2007, and 2008 that I haven’t flipped through since unpacking my clothes from those Europe trips. Sure, I wrote up some of that material, but much of it was put to the side when it was time to start organizing the NEXT trip. And it’s ALWAYS time to start organizing the next trip!
So, what’s my New Year’s resolution worth if I’ve always tried to live up to the resolve to keep on top of my Europe stories? Can I really become better at posting regularly if I’m perpetually generating new material? Anyone who’s visited my studio knows my piles of paper and thumb drives aren’t getting any smaller.
And it’s not like plowing through a cobweb-encrusted stack is a self-contained activity. I can’t spend an hour scanning old receipts from Copenhagen without spending a second hour researching those stores and restaurants in Copenhagen to see if they’re still in business now. Immersing myself in decade-old pictures of Florence makes me want to search the internet for all the locations in those photos to see how they look today. Europe blogging is as round as the globe. One note leads to another, and there’s never an end.
I’m resolving to post at least once every day in 2016. Guys, keep me honest. Stay on me. I need to finally write up all my old anecdotes before they fade from memory, and I also need to be on top of new information. I need to seduce you all with my travel glories past, and that seduction needs to propel you to Europe with me in the future. Gotta post about the past! Gotta post about what’s coming!
Gotta end this post and get to a post that’s not about how I need to post. Happy New Year!
Oh, Florence! That trip was wonderful. I don’t remember the name of our hotel but I vividly remember the walk from it past the Duomo and on to the Boboli Gardens. I could probably still do it today without a map. What was the name of that restaurant we ate at multiple times because it was so good? Osteria something or other? My other favorite discovery was the brutti ma buoni cookies from Antonio Mattei Biscotti in Prato. I tried to replicate them when I got home with terrible results.
Oh my gosh, and remember that old lady fell right in front of us in Bologna? Everyone was yelling in Italian…funny the things you remember.
Trips with Matt are always a good time!
You will do an excellent job, Matt! I cant imagine a better person to plan holidays in Europe with!!:-)