New Travels Meet Old

     In 1995, I took my first trip to Europe. It changed my outlook on life and forever made me a committed traveler. The second city I went to was Vienna, and I was hosted by this kind lady and her family. She was, at the time, my mother's boyfriend's daughter. But I was welcomed like family. In 1998, when I returned again for a two-month Europe tour, I visited her growing family in Graz, Austria. I pushed around her one-year-old's stroller, and her four-year-old joined us in sightseeing. This trip, she lives in Berlin, and we met up for a fabulous long evening, and I heard about those little girls' thriving careers. Time does fly. But Karen doesn’t look any older, and she is as warm as ever.

     The conversation about living in Europe was similar to what it always has been, but it has a new feel in the current era. The real question is how do you want to live your life? What kind of world do you want to live in? And is money more important to you than some of those answers you just got? Karen has a good life, but not a lot of luxuries. I don’t know if the time of life for me and my peers or the time in history, but I find a lot of people wanting a simpler life for themselves and a better world for their fellow citizens.