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Castleton in the morning...

Vermont...simplicity at its finest.

When I tell people I am from Vermont I often hear "I have never met anyone from there." I usually laugh and say something like "yeah its just me and the fam... lots of land though, pretty trees."

It can feel like that sometimes. For such a small state there is a lot of space to call your own. I grew up on a dead end street in a small colonial town surrounded by a farm on one side and mountains on the others. Beautiful. The people are simple, honest, and real. They wear what makes sense for the activity they are doing, they say what makes sense for the point they are making, and they listen when someone else is making theirs. Its a great place. A place I feel blessed to call "home."

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Lake Champlain

College and Chaos.

After my hometown of Castleton I must take a moment and recognize Vermont's only "true" city... Burlington. I am a proud alumni of Saint Michael's College ('04) which is nestled in the mountains and falls in one of the most picturesque cities I have ever seen.

Burlington is small by city standards and HUGE by Vermont's. It has a great live music scene, full of college kids (both University of Vermont and Champlain College, as well as a multitude of smaller programs) reside there.

Its gem is Church Street. A cobblestone street shut off to cars, only enjoyed by locals, skateboards, and street vendors. Bright flags line it in the summer announcing the latest concert series or community get together and in the winter twinkle lights are laced through-out the perfectly places trees acting as a canopy for those wrapped up in peacoats sharing hot cocoa. Okay go ahead... think this just got a little corny... but that is Burlington. It is a bit TOO ideal, a bit TOO perfect, and with that comes the comfort of knowing most of the people you run into, and knowing that you are safe here.

I loved it for many reasons. The people, the cafes, the amazing sandwichs are the freshest paninis, but one thing that Burlington has that no other part of Vermont has is ... diversity. With the tradition of Burlington's reputation comes the energy of newness. It is a remarkable city known for its activism in gay/lesbian rights, for its support of anti-war efforts, and for its sincere dedication to solving issues like world hunger and poverty. Every weekend brings with it a new parade, a new group, and new promise to do something about injustices...it a city of passionate people. For me it is another place I am proud to have lived in.

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The Gold Coast... Where the city meets the water.

Aussies and Kiwis: My Semester Abroad

I plan on expanding this into its own album because I took enough pictures to show you every inch of Australia and New Zealand's beauty and also because I cant possible capture what my trip "down under" meant to me in a few paragraphs...I lived in the Gold Coast and traveled around in awe of what I saw...

But it suffices to say that I spent only 5 months traveling the Eastern Coast of Australia and backpacked only a month around the Northern and Southern islands of New Zealands... and in that amount of time my life was changed. The reasons are many but to simply put it... I saw enough to know there was more to see.

The skydiving, the backpacking, the glacier hiking, the scuba diving in the great barrier reef, the sunrises and the sunsets mixed with monsoon afternoons and blazing days... and the kangaroos walking me to class on my campus (when I managed to go) and the birds twice my size (im a littler person, but still :) ) and the food, the wine, and the wine... right yes the wine :) The surf, the sand, the mountains, the peninsulas, and so on, and so on...

AMAZING. If you havent gone... go. Go now, and Go fast. For the more people that go the more that are told to go and I fear this untouched Treasure cant stay so raw and real for much longer. Go. :)

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My Adventure Out West.

It is safe to say Im very ancy. I question things and I wonder deeply. Wonderlust if you will. It took me West. I applied to a few M.A. programs and had decided on Pepperdine University in Malibu, CA. I currently lived in Vermont. It was a 3000 miles journey taken with my two best friends in a bright blue Chevy Cavalier with no AC, and no CD player.

Good times.

Again I will work this out into a full on report of the amazing little and large things we saw along the way of our own self designed route. A route which was determined over three extra large chai lattes from Dunkin Donuts back in NH. We left from Mass, hit up Chicago, Nebraska, many places in Colorado, The Grand Canyon, the four corners...etc. We also found ourselves sipping week old coffee in small cafes somewhere in Ohio I think, we found scary towns full of strange things, like Brule. Dear God that was crazy. We drove hours and hours, found ourselves in traffic surrounded by mountains, we lost our minds and danced in fields of black eyed susans, and jumped around the world with our conversations. We were pulled over, given a ticket, and released for speeding. glorious.

It was a great road trip and the perfect way to ease away from the old and into the new. I managed to let go of a lot in those 3000 miles and found myself at the doorstep of an amazing city... Los Angeles... the City of Angels.

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California. Home.

"And then she found herself...happy"

So I land in L.A. Scared to death. I will touch on this further, for I could write a novel on what I dislike about this city. I could write a sequel to that novel on what I don't understand. Then I would go on to write a third book in which I point out that although I would change much, I simply...

Cannot leave.

Yup I said it, much to my family's dismay... I love it here. I have spent a year living in Malibu, another year in Calabasas, and my last year in Venice. I have found a world that makes sense to me. I have realized that this city has it all from the places to see to the people to meet, and all in between...

Downtowns. Uptowns. Seaside Towns. Marinas. Dives. Lounges. Bars. The locals and the visitors, the old, young, single, married, crazies. Oh yes there are lots of them-- But here I am. Loving it.

I have found myself wandering streets and feeling a familiarity that I have longed for all my life. I can get in my car to head to work in my nicest heels and find sand on the seats, and I can wake up every Sunday knowing the farmer's market is going on only to end up that same evening in a cocktail dress sipping a good Cab. Its a city of extremes. Of Dynamic ups and downs... and lets be honest, we all need a bit more of that in our lives.