Don't Leave Home Without One
A travel itinerary is symbolic for so much of life.
The travel itinerary you're carrying around in your head is a lot like the map you probably used to carry in your glove compartment. It's got the big picture, but it doesn't tell you everything. It's a guide, but the route can be altered as you go along. If it were too detailed, it wouldn't be nearly as useful, and you'd spend all your time checking off places and directions instead of making discoveries along the way.
In which way do you tend to hold onto your travel itineraries? Do you plan every detail of a trip in advance, or do you like to wing it from here and there? What are some things that would be helpful for you to know about how others manage their itineraries, especially when planning for trips that may be spontaneous or where conditions might change frequently?
This week, my family and I returned from a whirlwind trip to Southern California, where we flew into Los Angeles, spent a week based in Carlsbad and San Diego, and then flew home from Los Angeles. The well-planned itinerary I coordinated before my trip had so many strikethroughs that it became a running joke between my husband and me. Renting a Tesla took way more coordination than we anticipated. An excursion to the Wild Animal Park was cut short because of a toddler meltdown cured by pizza at Fillippi’s in downtown Escondido, an institution with some of the best Italian food for more than 72 years.
Our trip highlights included:
seeing and spending time with framily;
hanging out at beaches in Carlsbad and La Jolla;
setting a new record of not opening my computer for 9 days;
participating in the coolest pub crawl fundraiser in North Park as part of the “Know it Ales” team. The fundraiser was to support Home of Guiding Hands, a San Diego-based nonprofit committed to providing the highest quality supports to maximize independence and quality of life for people with disabilities; and
watching my 2.5 and 4.5-year-old boys run around on the campus of my undergrad alma mater, Cal State San Marcos.
Travel itineraries are like our lives. They have a beginning, a middle, and an end. They have twists and turns. So many things can go wrong. And yet, you choose to pursue THIS one in the hopes of making a lasting impact.
Me Power Happenings
Check out this side-by-side! I was floored when I saw it.
If you’re in the DC area on Friday, February 17th, please join our exclusive event welcoming and celebrating Briana B. Franklin’s and The Prosp(a)rity Project team to Washington, DC. I first learned about Briana’s work while researching student loan debt and its impact on black women. The name of her organization caught my eye! The stylization of "prosp(a)rity" is a visual differentiator used to signify the merger of the words prosperity and parity. Under the weight of an estimated $35B in student loan debt, Black women face the greatest threat to building financial literacy and generational wealth. Briana and her team are working to change that.
The free networking event at the Edlinguist Solutions DC office space includes:
🥰 Light h'ordeuvres
🥰 Wine + non-wine drink options
🥰 Electronic copies of Me Power, an award-winning book that will "leave you uplifted and inspired." (Readers' Favorite 5-Star Review)
Last year, The Prosp(a)rity Project worked with 12 Black women to reduce their collective student debt by over $100,000!
Led by Briana B. Franklin, their innovative flagship program—the 35*2 Free Initiative—provides retroactive scholarships to qualified college-educated Black women (paid directly to their lenders) in combination with a year-long program of financial guidance and career coaching to serve as a catalyst to help these women move measurably toward financial freedom and success.
Three ⚡️ in 31 Seconds
⚡️ “The most important factor in education is not what you know, but who you are. Your identity is like a tapestry, woven together from the threads of your life. You chose some of those threads and some were chosen for you. Each thread represents a moment or experience in your past, which may stand out on its own. When put together, the threads create a whole greater than the sum of its parts. You wouldn’t be who you are without them.” (Adams, 2022, p. 86).
⚡️The Traveling Table Dinner series is live! The first three episodes can be watched on YouTube.
⚡️“Reframe the Narrative” from the bast
We move together, connected, towards our destiny
Resistance is futile.
Our path unclear
Our purpose uncertain
Yet, we move…
at times with the fury of awesome thunder
others, still but for our breath
Elusive the meaning woven in threads
Details with unmet ends
Until we step back
the tapestry in larger view
we see more of the whole,
Bound
We move together