Meant to write in November. The virus that is the crazy-as-a-loon (Minnesota national bird and a Minnesotan expression for the craziest of the crazy) president and the virus that is a virus overwhelmed my best intentions. New resolution. December. Daily. Upbeat. New President, new vaccine, new house, new travel plans. Here’s a post I started the other morning at 3 when I couldn’t sleep because…

At 3am this morning I decided it was time to ‘go back to my future.’ Through blogging, determination, hope and avocado toast. The future where I work and write and travel. The last few months have been surprisingly good however (at least when I’ve blocked out the rest of the world)… well-spent in moving from my nice-enough little apartment to a fancy townhouse. Not fancy-fancy, but by my lifetime of apartment-dwelling standards it could be called ‘moving on up’ Well we’re movin on up/To the east side/To a deluxe apartment in the sky/Movin on up/To the east side/We finally got a piece of the pie.(You do remember The Jeffersons, right?)

Long story short, it goes like this. My Albuquerque kids wanted to invest their money in a property. Son Steve fell in love with a friend’s for-sale townhouse. Being an excellent son he decided…killing two birds… he could offer his ageing mom a really nice place to live at an extremely modest rate and have a renter who would likely never throw another wild party in her entire life.

So here I am, 3am, in a rather elegant high-ceilinged, spacious, fire-placed living room surrounded by my finest IKEA tables, second-hand couch and chair, heirloom rocker, trunk and chests, and giant coffee table (especially handcrafted by my bro to allow my journals, notebooks, travel docs, manuscripts, Sunday papers, assortment of pens, clips, eye drops, vitamins and coffee cup to stay nearby). My giant gold, rust and black wall hanging acquired in 1999 from a street vendor in Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire is finally back up after many years of closet dwelling.

Oh yeah, and a garage, dining room, atrium (yes, really), patio… pleasant neighborhood halfway between Whole Foods and my gym. I feel like I should adopt a refugee family and four dogs…. Or upgrade my Costco sweat pants and ragged cashmere sweater from Kathmandu. I know…too many commercial mentions and traveler name-dropping.

End of December 2020 Blog Post #1. They’ll probably get better.