​Rome is an absolutely amazing city, and I wish we could have spent two weeks there instead of just about two days.

On our first day, we did a walking tour (in very hot heat), went to the Vatican (which was almost too packed to get to really SEE anything), and then ran to the Pantheon.

While Florence felt kind of like the city revolves almost completely around its Renaissance history (or maybe just the things we focused on?), Rome felt like, yeah, our history is there, and we're going to do our thing anyway. Rome was absolutely awesome, and a bunch of the kids even said they felt like this was the first city they felt like they could live in.

After our walking tour, we went to the Vatican. I  knew there was amazing art to see, and I had learned a lot about the construction of St. Peter's, but I didn't know a lot of the specifics on what was inside the Vatican museum itself. (Other than the Sistine Chapel - but you're not allowed to take pictures in there, and so I didn't. Cooler to experience and breathe anyway. Me and several hundred strangers. How strange).
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THEN we got to go into St. Peter's. I spent some time in college learning about this building, but I was 100% unprepared for how mind-bogglingly BIG this building is. Every inch of it is beautiful, a glorious, GIANT building that could bring you to your knees. I can't explain how powerful it was to just STAND in that building. The only thing I could think when I walked in - this is a church worth breaking a Church for, honestly.

St. Peter was buried on the site (apparently the Obelisk out front was there when he was crucified and buried), and under Constantine the first church was built on the site in the 4th century CE. In the 15th century it was in huge disrepair, so they began to try to repair, then decided to rebuild. There were many, many designs and redesigns. They had trouble with the dome for a while, but it got worked out. Every important architect or sculptor in the Renaissance and early Baroque periods worked on the building. Michelangelo, Bernini, Raphael, Bramante, Giacomo della Porta, Giuliano da Sangallo, were all involved. It's called the greatest church in all of Christendom - I haven't seen all of them, but I'm pretty inclined to agree. 

We had gotten to see some of the hand-drawn plans for this building just the day before, which was fabulously cool. My favorite part was the lines down the center of the nave telling how big other cathedrals in the world were compared to St. Peter's, and showing how thoroughly it dwarfs every one of them.
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We took a break after our very hot, crowded tour of the Vatican, and went to grab some dinner at a pizza place nearby. 

Apparently going into the Pantheon hadn't been part of the tour, and I expressed some disappointment to our tour guide. During dinner she came up to me and mentions that the last entrance at the Pantheon is at 7:15, and the place closes at 7:30. If we finish up dinner by 7, we can make it.

It's 7:05, and we're waiting for some kids outside the restaurant. One of my students pulls up the directions on Google Maps, and we literally sprinted through the streets of Rome, trying to make it in time, kids and one of my teacher friends running the whole way. This was maybe the hardest I laughed on the entire trip.

We got there with time to spare (we were told later it maybe wasn't 100% necessary for us to run), but both my teacher friend and I both cried when we walked in to the Pantheon, so... I'll keep my enthusiasm going til it fails me.
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We made it with just a few minutes to spare, ("OUTSIDE PICTURES LATER!") and stayed until they closed the building down around us. We got to watch them close the giant doors, and it was one of the coolest experiences I have ever had in my life. 

1) each of my kittens falling asleep on me for the first time
2) when J proposed to me
3) being at the Pantheon

I should work on the order but MAN this was cool.

10 second building run down:
The best preserved ancient Roman building left standing. It was completed in around 125 CE, but the inscription is from an earlier temple on the site, so that was confusing for a while. It's very architecturally important because of its geometry and its construction (there have been many, many writings on this, but very long story very short - it's amazing, go read about it). This was the largest spanning concrete dome until the Houston Astrodome, no joke. It was reconsecrated as a Christian church during the Middle Ages, lots of Christian sculptures added, and Raphael was buried here. The building was super important, studied and imitated very very often (including at Thomas Jefferson's University of Virginia!). 

The next morning, we got to see the Coliseum and the Roman Forum before leaving for Pompeii. It still boggles my mind how we were able to see and do so much in such a short amount of time. Amazing.

Also, the history of the Coliseum is maybe my favorite architectural history story ever, and writing it out would simply not do it justice. Ask me about it sometime in person, for real. I took over the tour bus microphone before getting to the site and started Schnurr Time with "Once upon a time, there was a guy named Nero who nobody liked." It gets way better from there.
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Next we went to the Roman Forum. This was again, much much cooler than I could have imagined it would be. I wish I had about 600 more hours of reading on ancient architecture and urbanism under my belt, but even just getting to walk through the streets and look at the ruins of building foundations (with some more recognizable monuments!) was just spectacular. One of the coolest parts - it's still an active excavation site! We passed some archaeologists at work, and I tried to convey my respect and admiration by not bothering them with my questions or fangirling, but.. not sure how those telepathic transmissions went.
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Rome was incredible, and I can't wait to go back. In the meantime, I want to read every single ancient architecture book I can get my hands on. This feeling got even stronger when we got to Pompeii.
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After delicious gelato, the group met back up to go walk to our fresco demonstration and workshop. Summer heat in Italy is no joke, and I think we all were probably ready for a nap before a painting class, but I am so, so glad we went.
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We did some more walking and exploring before dinner, and then on to the hotel before bed.

One of my favorite, completely unexpected parts of Florence was the street art. The city has tons of winding, narrow alleys, and do not enter one way streets everywhere, and people take advantage of that in hilarious, creative, and completely bizarre ways.
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The next morning we were up early to get on line at the Accademia. This was one of the only places we couldn't get reservations ahead of time, so we left the hotel at 7:45 to go wait. I think we came at the height of tourist season, because this day was the most crowded in Florence.

In the interest of complete honesty, I wasn't sure the David was going to blow me away. I had seen so many photos of it, and the reproduction in front of the Palazzo Vecchio just the day before. I figured I knew what it was all about, and that it would be cool to see, but that it was just another stop in our day. I have never been so pleased to be proven wrong.
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Michelangelo's unfinished sculptures flank the sides of the room leading to David, and these were honestly just as cool as seeing the masterpiece. Getting to see him actually pull the figure from a block of rough stone is pretty unfathomable. This was so unexpected, and so, so cool. Almost makes you think you could do it, you now? Reminds me of Elton John - "If I was a sculptor, but, then again, no." And I am certainly no sculptor. (One time in college, we had to reinterpret a classical sculpture, and I turned a reclining Venus into a sexy cartoon pinup badger. I'll leave my sculpture experience - or lack thereof - at that.)

And then the room opens up, and this is what you see.

The statue stands at around 17 feet tall. His hands and feet are way too big, because apparently David was supposed to go on top of a church, and this was supposed to be for perspective. But alas, he was too naked and too popular, and he was instead plopped outside the Palazzo Vecchio, right in the piazza, for several centuries. Our awesome tour guide the day before had told us that his glare was said to be looking either towards Rome, Florence's rival, or looking down the powerful Medici family themselves. Ah, art history and political symbolism. 
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We had a short break where we went over to San Lorenzo. I was dying to get inside, but was improperly dressed. We hadn't been anticipating this break time, or visiting churches, so my shoulders and knees weren't covered. They are apparently pretty serious about this rule. We instead snuck a peek at the courtyard and Michelangelo's stairway next door to San Lorenzo in the Laurentian Library. (The picture of the staircase isn't mine because we were just peeking in and I didn't get to grab one, but here's something from Google for reference anyway.)
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Next stop: we got to go INSIDE the Duomo Cathedral, Santa Maria della Fiore. I wound up buying some scarves in the piazza outside, and wrapping myself up. Not my best fashion moment, but it was 100% worth it.
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It also warmed my heart that we got to see Brunelleschi's tomb. It's in the catacombs of the church, which are pretty cool, but by this point in the trip my standard for cool was a little bit distorted from its usual scale. You have to walk through the gift shop to get to it, which will never not make me laugh. I don't know if I'll ever get used to the idea of gift shops in churches, but this one was hilarious. This amazing architect will be forever monumentalized, right next to the postcards & souvenir pencils.
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After getting to go into the nave of the Cathedral, something extremely important happened.

I had the best. pizza. of. my. entire. life. Celiac or no. It was simply the best pizza of all time. The crust - perfection. The sauce - unbelievable. The cheese - delightful. If I were a poet, I would write sonnets. If I could compose things, there would be a symphony. My life has found meaning, and it is in THIS. PARTICULAR. PIZZA.
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I ate this beautiful pizza, all of it, walking through the streets of Florence on the way to the Uffizi gallery. I'd just like to bask in that sentence for a little while... Ok I'm good.

We went to go wait on line for our group reservation at the Uffizi, and we stood under the staff entrance overhang (because air conditioning). As we left to head to the entrance, I stopped to take a picture of a sign, and the coolest thing in the world happened.

I ran into one of my professors from the University of Virginia! My Renaissance Architecture professor Cammy Brothers was walking in the staff entrance, in the middle of the Piazza della Signoria in Florence. We hadn't seen each other in the two years since my graduation, but I had taken several of her classes, and been her research assistant during my grad school days. (I had helped her work on some of the foot notes for one of her impending books on Renaissance art! Not that fun!) We chatted for a bit, and it occurred to me that people always SAY it's a small world, but... sometimes it really is.

After wandering through the Uffizi, I found one of her books in their book store. It was like 60 euro, so I didn't buy it there, but look how cool! I kept telling my students - she LITERALLY wrote the book on Michelangelo. (The new one, where she doesn't think Mannerism is a thing.)
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The Uffizi itself was magnificent. It's everything you want it to be, but cooler. 

It's hard to pick a favorite, but one of my favorite parts was an exhibit on Giuliano da Sangallo's architectural drawings (the actual real ones that he actually drew) in the mid-15th century. (This was one of the moments where being 25 and not having been to Europe before really hit me. This was a knees-shaking, is this really happening moment for me - and wouldn't be the last of those.)
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Giuliano da Sangallo was a really important Renaissance architect and sculptor. He did a lot of work for the Medici family, villas and things like that, as well as a couple of buildings for Popes Julius II and Leo X. He was sort of the successor of Alberti and Brunelleschi, and was said to be a big influence on the ninja turtle artists Rafael, Leonardo, and several da Sangallos down the line. Bramante was an architect during the same period (high Renaissance, 1500s), who worked mostly in Rome. His biggest project (size wise and importance wise) was St. Peter's.

I wish I could keep taking classes forever, and learning about all of these things. This was such an amazing experience, to get to go here and see these works, and think these thinks. I don't know if I have words to explain it.
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Leonardo da Vinci's Annunciation and the unfinished Adoration of the Magi were outrageously cool. Titian's Venus of Urbino, and Botticelli's Birth of Venus were flooring (and much bigger than I expected, honestly).
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It seems a little silly to take off-center photos of these paintings when every art history textbook ever has better reproductions (taken at better angles!). But the color in the Birth of Venus wasn't what I had expected, and it just made me happy to have my own photos of them. Like that famous picture that went around a while ago of everybody taking selfies with the Mona Lisa instead of, I don't know, looking at it? I guess we are all guilty of that.

This last day in Florence was amazing in so many ways, but mostly it just made me realize I have so much more to learn. I hope at some point I will take more classes, learn more things, and spend some more time turning all this over in my mind. It sort of made me wonder why I bothered majoring in modernism. Maybe there's a baby Renaissance scholar somewhere in the back of my head. I spent my bus ride nap to Rome contemplating alternate master's theses on Florentine urbanism, or castles in Renaissance Spain.

Being a teacher has been the coolest hybrid profession in the world - Thing Explainer, cheerleader, artist, comic book maker, video game analyst, 3D model maker, Photoshop guru. Maybe it's time for me to figure out how to fit architectural historian back into that mix.
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Florence is without a doubt one of my favorite places in the entire world.

This was like walking face first into one of my architectural history textbooks from undergrad. I would turn a corner, and BOOM, there was an incredible, amazing, historic building.  I wound up skipping lunches and shopping opportunities to go look at yet another building, or catch another monument. I think I raised more than a couple of eyebrows, munching on a protein bar and insisting that yes, I was ok to skip the nice sit down lunch, I needed to go to this specific church.
​I just didn't want to miss a single thing. 
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We got into town, and began our walk to the restaurant for dinner when all of a sudden - "You guys, is that the Palazzo Medici?" (blank stare) "Ms. S, I have no idea what you're talking about!" (It WAS the Palazzo Medici). We didn't go in, but I did get to stick my camera in between the bars of the courtyard for a picture! Good enough for a non-stop on our itinerary, and I began to understand that Florence was going to be a very, very big deal for me.
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After dinner the first night, we had the chance to shop or wander. I took a couple of students to see the nearby Santa Maria Novella and Ospedale degli Innocenti. 
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We had some time to wander and enjoy the city, and everything was beautiful. There were some pretty aggressive panhandlers in the piazza by the Duomo, but the kids handled themselves just fine. They're from New York, after all. I think the coolest part of the trip so far is that this hotel was walking distance from everything, and we could just wander back as a team.

The next morning we woke up to climb the Duomo. The kids had been warned within an inch of their lives "YES, it's a lot of steps." "No, there's no air conditioning." and we were off to the races.
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I think we were one of the first tours allowed in, so the day was still nice and cool. There was also basically nobody ahead of us, which was great. They let us in a little side door, and up and up we went. (And check out that marble! *Swoon*)

One thing I think photos do not do justice is how GIANT this building is. The streets of Florence are very close, the city is packed pretty densely onto its historic footprint. And then all of a sudden, the piazza opens up, and you have one of the largest cathedrals in the world BAM right in front of you.

Fun fact: that major facade in the front - 19th century! The rest of the cathedral was much earlier. Arnolfo di Cambio, freaking Giotto, Brunelleschi, his apprentice Donatello, Michelozzo, Verrocchio and his apprentice, young Leonardo da Vinci all had a hand at this building. It's like a who's who of Renaissance architecture, they all wanted to be a part of this magnificent building. 
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​The view kept getting more awesome as you went up - here's a shot out one of the tiny windows. 

It was absolutely amazing - you're actually climbing between Brunelleschi's two domes (the inner one is strutural, the outer one is prettier).

What's the big deal about this dome, anyway?
1) It's pretty (no really, it's art history, that matters)
2) It's huge, and nobody had successfully spanned a space that large before.

You got to walk along the inner rim of the dome, and get CLOSE up to the frescoes in the ceiling. It was stunningly cool.
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And then we got to the top.

After, we went into the Baptistery. I told the kids it was built in 1096, but the real years are 1059-1128. Other than the Temple of Dendur at the Met, this is the oldest building I have had the pleasure of seeing. It was kind of staggering to think that we have tiny fountains in Catholic churches these days to dunk baby heads in, but they had this giant city monument to St. John. Pretty cool, and very different times.
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We had a tiny bit of free time, so I went with several of the other teachers to check out this Baptistery and the Duomo Museum. I had been hoping to get inside the Cathedral, but there was a line wrapping most of the way around the church and I didn't think we had time! (Turns out one of the teachers did get in, but it really didn't look that way! But don't worry, I got in the next day.)

They have dozens of priceless statues and sculptures, of course (Europe!), and even a model of the way the Cathedral facade would have looked during the medieval period (before that 19th century remodel I mentioned). They had the bronze doors of the Baptistery by Ghiberti, adored by Vasari and Michelangelo and most people afterwards. They took the real ones off the building so they could preserve them a little better. There was a huge competition in the 15th century to build them, much drama, many Medicis involved. All good stuff.
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One of the coolest things about this museum (which were many) was Michelangelo's second to last sculpture.

​Michelangelo wanted this Pieta to sit near the site where he would be buried, but he found a flaw in the marble and trashed the statue. It's kind of awesome to think of the master throwing an epic temper tantrum like that. They pieced it back together, and here it is. 

We went to a leather making workshop (sales pitch), did a walking tour of the city with an amazing local guide (best walking tour of the entire trip), did a fresco painting workshop, and ate. This was SUCH a long day, but such a good day. I skipped the nice sit down lunch (maybe a mistake?) to go see Santa Croce and the Pazzi Chapel (decidedly not a mistake, SO SO SO SO cool). It still boggles my mind that we managed to fit this many things into a day, but we did, and maybe that's part of why I slept for almost a solid week when we got back. Art history hangover.
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I even came across this extremely cool relic, meaningful to me because this guy is the patron saint of the school I teach at! If I am translating properly, this is part of the habit of St. Francis of Assisi from the 13th century. It was just tucked into a back room of this church, with a sign from a printer and absolutely no fanfare. Wow.
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AND THEN, I TURNED THE CORNER, AND THERE WAS THE PAZZI CHAPEL.

I think that maybe I should have paid more attention in class to where things were that I was learning about? But I honestly had no idea that I would see this. I suppose my general directional helplessness got me two delightful surprises in Florence, but I was taken totally unaware.
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The Pazzi Chapel was designed by Brunelleschi (dome guy), and started construction in 1429. Some historians argue it was somebody else, but for the sake of your attention span, let's just call it Brunelleschi. It is considered one of THE examples of Renaissance architecture perfection (check out that facade- it's almost exactly a triumphal arch!). The interior is absolutely stunning, but extremely hard to photograph. It was so, so cool to see in person. And by accident.
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And then I got delicious strawberry gelato. We did more on this day, but this seems like a great place to halt for now - gelato + the facade of Santa Croce.
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We arrived in Venice for dinnertime, on this gloriously overcast, kind of murky-looking day that made the colors of the place just POP. (I haven't edited any of the pictures yet, please bear with me here, you'll have to take my word for it!). You have to come in by boat, and the city just kind of appears on the waterline, like one of those popup books with really cool castles in them. 

I wound up running to the front of the boat, leaving the Scooby gang and all my charges inside (woops!) while I MARVELED at this city. I don't know if I've marveled in a while, it was pretty cool. It was almost like my life had become a movie, and I had become much, much cooler. I knew immediately this was going to be one of the most magical places I'd ever been.
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We wandered through the streets a bit, through awesome tiny winding alleys that didn't seem like they could possibly be real. Even the "wide" streets could probably only fit 3 people across. We went to a little hole in the wall restaurant, where I had the best red sauce of my entire life (sorry, Grandma!). I will dream about that sauce. And definitely more later on traveling with Celiac.

And every so often, you'd make your way out of these tiny, crowded, winding streets and get a view like this:

The next morning, we began our sight seeing tour in earnest, traversing well over 20,000 steps (according to one chaperone's Fitbit) across the tiny, awesome city. We wandered a bit, took a walking tour, saw an unbelievable glass blowing demonstration on Murano, and got to check out the littler island for some free time.
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We made our way back to the main island, where we got to GO INTO THE PALAZZO DUCALE and hang out in ST. MARK'S SQUARE. This did not stop being cool, at any point on the trip.

For one of the first times in my young life, I started seeing buildings I had only learned about in class and in books. It was staggering, humbling, and weirdly emotional. I think I will be in love with Venice forever.
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We visited the absolutely glorious Museo Correr, that I wished I could spend three years in. This was the place that made me promise myself I'd be back.

We went on an absolutely unbelievable gondola ride through the canals, which I will relive in dreams and paintings for many, many years.

The colleague I got lost with in the prison (ha!) showed us how to make sure we were buying legitimate Venetian masks made there (not knockoff imports, or anything like that). I was searching for one my fiance might like too, so we could hang it up in the apartment. I wound up with one with music notes (more on our musical roots later!). 

After dinner we took a water taxi (!) back to Lido de Venezia, where we had been staying. I skyped with fiance a little bit, got to say hello to my kittens, after watching one of the coolest sunsets I'd ever seen.

We drove from Milan to Venice, which was the perfect opportunity for a bus nap. Jet lag is a real thing, you guys.

We arrived in Verona and drove through the suburban-sprawl-ey area to the historic downtown, formerly walled city. Buses have to buy a pass ahead of time to enter this area of town.

We walked across this bridge on the way in, which gave us a beautiful view of the city and mountains beyond. It's been under five hours in Italy so far, and I am in love.

We got an amazing look at the historic wall surrounding the town, which I wish we could have gotten a little bit more information on. But here it is, and here we were, and on we went.

Verona has the third largest surviving Roman arena, which is used now for opera festivals and performances. When we walked up, there were huge piles of set elements and props, from twenty foot tall heads to decaying chairs and spinning wheels. It was eerie and fabulous.

The next stop was Juliette's window. According to the Italians, Shakespeare stole his famous tragedy from an Italian writer, and the inspiration for Juliette lived in this place, and this was her balcony. 

They have done all kinds of restoration work, and you can visit exhibits, and get to imagine wildly ill-fated love and iambic pentameter and all that good stuff.

But one of the coolest parts of this site was the walkway on the way in. People graffitied everything, on bandaids and tape, to gum, and the wall itself. Love finds its tributes in the strangest ways.

Traveling with 32 teenagers is turning out to be way easier than I thought.

We got to JFK super early, everything was going extremely well. My little group of six (to be referred to as "the Scooby Gang" until further notice) was heading in to security when "Hey Ms. S, is that smoke??" and cue the fire alarm.

The terminal was on fire. The culprit: a grease fire at Panda Express. It was on the news. It was so bad they evacuated the terminal, even kicking people who were at the gate out of the secured area. Bad news. Sirens.

We were stuck in the entrance to the terminal by baggage check, standing for over two hours, trying to keep together a group of 42 (plus parents who hadn't left). The terminal kept getting more crowded as more and more people arrived for their flights. The airport had shut off the air conditioning, and none of us had brought water, because you can't typically get it through security anyway.

Luckily our kids are troopers, but we were off to a rocky start. We had some first time flyers with us who were NOT thrilled.

We got to our gate just as they were announcing last call for boarding to Milan. No time to get water, no time to do anything but head count the earnest + wonderful Scooby Gang and be on our merry way.

I discovered the wonderful flight tracker, and followed my first trip across the Atlantic as I went. SO COOL. We passed over Nova Scotia, and then lots of blue (which I luckily slept through). I brought a u-pillow with me, put it down on the snack tray in front of me, threw my face in the middle, and passed out for a few hours.

We landed in Milan in the morning, where our bus was waiting for us. And off we go!

In the 18th century, men of means (and sometimes women, with proper chaperones) would embark on a great journey when they came of age. They would travel the great historic sites of western Europe and visit the great empires of the past, taking in great sites of England and France, then move southwards, towards Rome, Herculaneum, Pompeii. They consumed art and culture, picking up languages and commissioned work, spending fabulous amounts of money and lavishing in the perks of well-funded civilization hopping. It was considered a great educational rite of passage to prepare these young aristocrats for an ever-appealing well-rounded life.

I'm doing something like that myself. This summer, I am visiting all the old building block places in my life, and tacking on some new ones, too. And it fits together in the coolest ways.

It means a lot to me that the important places from my history (actual and intellectual) are places I'm going alone. I'm getting married to my favorite human being on the planet in 236 days, according to my WeddingWire app, but before that I get to figure out how big the inside of my brain is, and go on my own Grand Tour.

Itinerary:
June 2017: Savannah, GA
July 2017: Italy
August 2017: Charlottesville, VA

I went to college in Savannah, and this spectacularly unusual city holds a huge place in my heart. I learned so much about architecture and academic love, and I did a lot of growing up here.

Recently my friend C, who lives in New York, surprised and delighted me by deciding she wanted to do her bachelorette weekend in Savannah. (Yes please!!) It had been about 4 years since I visited, and there has been a lot of life in my life since then. So we headed down the first weekend of June.

​The whole city unfolded in front of me, in exactly the way I remembered, but with a completely different me observing it. I'm not the first person to experience such weirdness, so I won't try to unpack it, but it was amazing, and humbling, and so, so good for my heart.

This is where I fell in love with architecture. This is where I started to learn the things we build are relics of ourselves as much as they are brick and mortar. It's awesome.

The city is gorgeous, a tribute to antebellum beauty with surprising midcentury gems sprinkled in. Savannah also has lanes (called "alleys" in less wonderful places), built right into the city plan. These utilitarian arteries were hidden from the more formal street views, the functional and slave-inhabited streets shielded from the views of the more affluent, delicate members of society. 

I have started doing research for my month at Monticello. My comic book / graphic novel (more explanation later) is going to follow the paths of an enslaved person across the plantation of Thomas Jefferson in the early 19th century. These lanes would have been roughly 50 years later than my story, but there was something really poignant for me, pulling at this thread.

At the end of June, beginning of July, my school is doing an amazing ten-day trip to Italy. (This probably lines up the best with our more traditional idea of the Grand Tour!). We are going from Milan - Venice - Florence - Rome - Pompeii - the Amalfi Coast. I am finally going to see in person the buildings that occupied most of my scholarly imagination while I was in school. I had two minors in grad school - ancient and Renaissance architecture, so this is perfect in every imaginable way!

I have been awarded an amazing fellowship at the International Center for Jefferson Studies, and in August, I am going to be living at Monticello. This is going to be a truly special part of my year, and probably my life, if I'm being honest.

I loved learning at the University of Virginia. I had phenomenal teachers, I got to completely dive into academics, and tease out new and absurd ways for my brain to work. I wish I could stay in school forever. But the end of my masters degree was truly difficult for me. My hip was falling apart, I was using a walker most days, and I was not in a great mental place to tackle the challenges ahead of me. I did it, but it was not pretty.

Returning is exciting in an intellectual way, but it also feels a lot like another shot at the questions I didn't get answered yet.

I think it's awesome that I get to go see the Pantheon and THEN Monticello (I think TJ would have particularly appreciated that timeline). I get to see and feel the sights Enlightenment scholars were also so thrilled by, and then delve into their century. It just follows so nicely.

I am going to throw myself back in to research and learning, and then try to make my own sense of it in a creative (and crazy) project. I could not be more excited about it. More, more, more about this later. Stay tuned.

Next stop: Italy! I leave in four days.