This year, I walked through more grief than I thought I could handle. There were many moments when I was sure I would break. Sometimes I still feel like I might. This was not a year of gentle transition or peaceful endings. It was a year that felt cruel. I willingly left an ecosystem I loved more dearly than I had ever loved anything. I left a life that had grown thick with meaning and texture. I miss my dog and my old cat Hector with an ache that doesn’t leave. I miss feedin

Should auld acquaintance be forgot, And never brought to mind? (Should old friends be forgotten and never remembered?) Should auld acquaintance be forgot, And auld lang syne? (Should old relationships be forgotten, and the time we shared long ago?) For auld lang syne, my jo, For auld lang syne, (For the sake of old times, my dear, for the sake of what has been,) We’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet, For auld lang syne. (we’ll still share a drink of goodwill for the sake of old tim

I’ve been carrying a heavy mix of emotions lately. Back home, in the streets where I grew up, innocent and hardworking Mexican immigrants are being taken into big unmarked trucks — disappeared under the cover of night. Families are left wondering where their loved one is and if they will ever see them again. Dreams are erased. People who have built lives among people they thought were friends are treated like they don’t belong anymore. Watching those videos makes something in

This message is an invitation to stay awake. The world is shifting quickly, and uncertainty has a way of making people search for a deadline. The question keeps surfacing: How long do we have? How long before leaving becomes harder, before circumstances change, before the options available today are no longer available tomorrow? I don’t think anyone can answer that honestly. There is no reliable countdown, and history does not give us a neat sequence of stages that tells us w

There comes a point in every great transition when the horizon disappears. The plans that once gave you direction crumble. The numbers stop making sense. The people who promised to stay fade into their own uncertainty. And suddenly, you’re left standing in the ashes of what used to feel solid, with no clear path ahead. It is a particular kind of emptiness because you have not only lost something behind you; you have lost your ability to picture what comes next. The old dream

For those who have lost almost everything and are still daring to begin again. When you choose to move, truly move, not as a tourist or an adventurer but as someone rebuilding from the ashes, you step into a life that demands trust. Not the easy kind of trust that comes with clear plans and safety nets, but the kind that asks you to keep moving even when you cannot see very far ahead. There is only so much you can plan before moving to another country. Eventually you arrive,

There is something unsettling about imagining that you might have to leave your home in minutes. Most of us don’t want to think about it, and most of the time we don’t have to. But fires, floods, severe weather, evacuations, and other emergencies sometimes give people very little time to decide what comes with them and what stays behind. In those moments, even simple decisions become harder. You are not calmly standing in your bedroom considering what might be useful. You may

A hearth doesn’t disappear just because the walls around it are temporary. Sometimes the fire burns in borrowed spaces — a short-term rental, a friend’s spare room, a hotel, even a place that doesn’t feel like “yours” at all. In these in-between moments, the hearth is less about permanence and more about imagination. I’ve learned that even when life feels transient, I can still kindle that sense of home. Sometimes it is as simple as brewing coffee the way I love, letting the

When people imagine moving to Europe, they often picture fairy-tale streets, slow mornings with espresso, and endless time to enjoy art,...