let's go on a journey, she said.
as we are in our last weeks before we fly off to spain, i'd love for you to join me, here, on this journey. i thought maybe you'd like to know more about what to expect here on my substack account.
when i started my substack account, i was just… wanting to try it out. everyone was migrating, it seemed, to substack for their newsletters and blogs and i wanted to see what the fuss was about. i had things to talk about- beauty, and rest, and giving yourself permission to enjoy these things, and more, sure… but now i really have something to talk about.
i am moving to spain with my husband and thirteen year old daughter. we will be fixing up a home that was built in 1700. we won’t be working—only passive income allowed on the visa we are requesting. so i will be a full time artist and writer, a full time adjuster to this new life. a life that, though new in so many ways, is also in a region of spain that i have lived in before, a region which already holds is so much of our story that it feels in some ways like going home.
you see, this is the story: my husband and i met in spain. barcelona, to be exact. the day after i landed in spain, spied him across the room. engaged eight months later. married in a park there. spent our first couple years of married life there. now, as we approach our 20 year anniversary, we are returning-but this time, to a tiny little magical town called L’Albi, outside of Barcelona just over an hour. i will be documenting all of it- the artmaking, of course, but also the rooms and rooms of old wallpaper being torn down, the driving lessons, the meals, the olive groves and the little plaza in front of our home filling with Spanish and Catalan celebrations.
i’ll be documenting my thoughts on practicing beauty, how traveling or living in a new place makes it easier to be an observer of beauty and wonder, and how i want to continue to cultivate those observation skills even when the freshness wears off, because we all need to notice beauty.
even as the trump trials and the genocide in palestine and the climate crises (yes, plural)unfold before us, so too does the blooming almond tree and the flickering candles and the kindness of a neighbor. all this beauty is unfolding as well, and i think we need to remember to pay attention to it all—the beauty included—if we are going to survive it and make a world that is a kinder and more generous and open one-a more beautiful world.
i’ll be documenting it all here on substack, and i would love for you to come along with me on the journey:
i want to continue bringing reminders of beauty, permission, rest. of gratitude. i want to continue documenting the beauty in the world, the beauty in the everyday life. i want to share what i as an american am learning from spain about beauty, as a practice, as an everyday experience in everyday spaces.
about finding beauty wherever you are; about how practicing beauty–seeking it out, creating it, and sharing it with others, despite what is going on all around you. about fine-tuning your sensibilities to practice beauty no matter the place or circumstance–that this is a rebellion, a survival tool, a refusal to give up, a way to make the world a better place. i truly believe that, and i believe we need that now, more than ever.
how will we make it through without still holding onto the beauty that is in the world, that is possible in the world? how will we make it through without fighting tooth and nail to make more beauty in this world, here, right where we are, in our homes, in our communities, in our cities and in our fields?
beauty, beauty, beauty: make it, refuse to stop making it, make more, make more, make more.
