Sacré-Coeur, Paris – Taken during my trip last December.
After starting out with a bang and aiming to document all of my adventures in and around Los Angeles, I haven’t written in this space in quite some time. It’s not because I’ve been holed up in the house, slaving away on that unfinished book (I wish that was it), and it’s not because I haven’t gone anywhere around the city all summer. So what gives?
While I’ve been hanging out in and around L.A. for the past three months, my lack of travel travel, you know the kind where you board a plane and go somewhere AMAZING, has been giving me the blues.
After going on some very life changing trips (*whispers* London, I miss you) within the last year, my traveling has stalled, and I have yet to go…anywhere…all summer. I’m thoroughly annoyed and going through massive withdrawals.
Recently, I stumbled on Jacqueline Luckett’s latest novel, Passing Love, and it has once again stoked the travel bug.
The novel follows Nicole-Marie Handy, a 57-year-old woman whose life is a list of “dittos.” Despite wanting more, Nicole is unmarried, a dutiful daughter to aging parents, a worker bee, and is involved in a long-time affair with one of her bosses who dangles a hasty marriage proposal in front of her to keep her stuck in a rut. After the death of her closes friend, she decides to cash in her vacation days and head to Paris for a month.
I’m not quite halfway through the book, but I love it already. The way Luckett describes Paris make me soooooooo very jealous. I wish I had scribbled more details in my journal about the streets and the people during my brief, but wondrous, trip to the City of Lights instead of just wandering aimlessly down les boulevards.
Reading Passing Love not only makes me miss Paris, but traveling in general. I miss that indescribable feeling when you first step off of the plane and you are so full of emotions you don’t know whether to laugh or burst into tears. I miss not knowing where to go first, but knowing that I have to go…somewhere. I miss it all. And I need to hit the road again.
Before this year is over, I’m going somewhere, anywhere. I’m desperate to make it happen.