"I don't want to own anything until I know I've found the place where me and things belong together. I'm not quite sure where that is just yet. But I know what it's like.' She smiled, and let the cat drop to the floor. 'It's like Tiffany's,' she said."

-Truman Capote, Breakfast at Tiffany’s

What you find when you open your eyes in your hometown.

"America has only three cities: New York, San Francisco, and New Orleans. Everywhere else is Cleveland." - Tennessee Williams A little bit of hometown glory was spent this February wandering the French Quarter with friends and spending time with my family. More on Mardi Gras soon, but it was a good trip to take a break from London. Always gives you perspective.

As the January gloom sets in over London I keep smelling the salty air and the sand in my feet in the Caribbean. So much is unknown right now, but what I do know is that travel makes life an adventure. As 2016 moves along I'm trying to be present with my days and remember the rainbow.

“Why are you sad?” “Because you speak to me in words and I look at you with feelings.”

- Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina

(via https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AUJW1Kd4zik)

For those of you, like me, who are in need of a deep re-charge follow along this yoga camp. I have used Adriene’s videos before, but I just started this series as an ‘I’m 30 let’s be zen January’ goal. She’s easy to follow, delightful, and the videos slowly build and our a great combo to some good old-fashioned cardio!

Returning home to my city of New Orleans:

Returning home for most people is literally being hugged by the people we love that we live far away from to explore our own dreams and potential. Yet coming home is also about re-visiting the places and food we desperately miss, especially for Southern Americans. Here in London I catch myself often with massive hunger pains for trays of fresh sushi that doesn’t break the bank or poy boys that remind me of Mardi Gras time firmly following my father’s figure through the parade route. The more I go home the more I find new loves, like running in Audubon Park where at 7 am in middle school I would meet my Environmental Science teacher to do water quality collection tests. Or the Columns Hotel bar which is now my meeting spot with an old high school friend who I’ve seen get married and finish her PHD. Although I may never live in New Orleans again, I love to visit it and remind it that no matter where I go it will always be my hometown.

Ice skating in London is one of those things off a Buzzfeed listical you should actually do. This year I went to the Natural History museum, despite choppy ice it was a beautiful setting and pretty picturesque. Next year I will try to make it to Somerset House. Now in the New Year it is already nice to remember this season and a great end to 2015.

Tis the season here in London, which is such a great city to see how visual Christmas can really be. Between markets and ice skating and shopping there is also so much to for free here like just strolling through all the lights. I'll be adding more as the days roll by, but using this time to reflect on what this time of year really means to me.

Thinking about what comes next in my life the people around me keep reminding me whether positively or negatively to be in the now. Lots left to see in London and ready to share it all here.

“Perhaps, after all, romance did not come into one’s life with pomp and blare, like a gay knight riding down; perhaps it crept to one’s side like an old friend through quiet ways; perhaps it revealed itself in seeming prose, until some sudden shaft of illumination flung athwart its pages betrayed the rhythm and the music, perhaps… perhaps…love unfolded naturally out of a beautiful friendship, as a golden-hearted rose slipping from its green sheath.”

— Lucy Maud Montgomery, Anne of Avonlea

I had coffee and a walk with a friend today. Sundays here in Brixton, South London, are for strolling when the weather is actually nice and fall exhumes around us. So many women in my life are coming to the end of relationships and I hear of more endings through friends. As I keep looking for my next love all these women keep reminding me that our friends are the true loves in our lives. And the love we give to ourselves. Just taking a moment to be grateful sounds ferociously banal, but I am giving it a shot today.

Thinking of my recent Paris trip today and how much has changed since May. Life in London continues to be a journey and as I approach 30 I reflect more on where I have been and where I still want to go. To return to Paris, a city I lived in for a summer when I was 20 in 2006 was surreal. Yet I found myself remember so many of the streets and smells, it was all the same, but yet I had changed. Living in a new city is so different than just passing through. I am lucky I had the time to absorb Paris, feel my own independence, and frankly, learn to cope with some social isolation from a peer group. I made sure to bring my friends along to Café de Flore where I had my classes every week, the coffee was even better and the company full of much more love. 

"Then there is the matter with Julie Delpy, a stern reminder that the first duty of a film critic -the  sole qualification to be honest- is to fall regularly, and pointlessly, in love with people onscreen. Once this stops happening, you might as well give up and get a proper job."

- Review of Before Sunrise by Anthony Lane, Nobody’s Perfect, pg. 103

"In the world of normal discourse I was like a tourist-a dying tourist-on a twilight tour of Europe. Each sunset, each spire, each cobblestoned path, each lobby, each glass of local beer is monumental, tragic, and unparallelled."

- Endless Love by Scott Spencer, pg. 332

"…Isn’t it nice to think that tomorrow is a new day with no mistakes in it yet?"

- Anne of Green Gables by LM Montgomery, pg. 171

I cannot believe I was here just five years ago with my friend Alex driving out to Los Angeles for my big move out to California. The Grand Canyon has now become a beautiful marker for beginnings in my life. I was able to share this new start with my brother and feel how small we are in such an immense landscape. It may be freezing (remnants of my Syracuse life), but we are making the most of it!