It Started in Sitges.

Learning to be spontaneous

Roughly thirty years ago, I discovered the Spanish beach town of Sitges. And I fell devotedly, wantonly, and somewhat recklessly in love.

Not just with the calming sound of the Mediterranean waves as they smooth the soft sand playas, or the way the sun backlights the drifting clouds, or how strangers often greet me with lingering eyes and smiles as though they have known me my whole life.

I began to fall in love with me.

With the carefree wanderer, happy in my single bed attic room in a one star pension, marveling 18th century church relics in a waterfront museum by day or dancing shirtless at midnight to a Debbie Harry remix, under a relentlessly spinning mirrorball.

From that initial day in Sitges, I did what I felt like doing. Provoked by a curiosity to encounter things first hand and build my stamina for unmeditated adventure, I engaged firstly and deeply with the seductive spirit of this sea-swept town. What I discovered is that I felt more alive traveling on instinct and engaged wonder, than when I was paging through well-worn travel guides about what to see and do in any particular area.

Just a twenty-five minute train ride from Barcelona, Sitges signifies a way of living in the world that is both liberated and culturally grounded. A magnet city for LGBTQ folks, the town also boasts an international film festival and first rate museums that highlight the cultural and artistic richness of Catalonia. Modernist hotels, bistros, and late night taverns accommodate the busy summer months, but the rest of the year, Sitges promises quiet strolls along the beach promenade, morning tai chi meditations at the shoreline, and off season music concerts.

I decided years back when I first encountered Sitges, that I wanted to use my travels as a way of resetting my inner compass, to figure out the person I was as well as the person who I was becoming.

I did that in part by fusing meaningful connections with local landmarks, opening up to my ability to stay agile and present in the moment, (despite pervasive uncertainties about the cultural landscapes) and keeping a rigorous journal that helped create a personal travelogue reflecting a dynamic dialogue between traveling and just being.

(Seaside in Catalonia, from a recent trip back to Sitges, just this year, 2024!)

Decades later, after a successful career of teaching writing to university students in Chicago, and producing three travel inflected books, Spontaneous Me, a weekly travelogue, is born.

Join me every week as I share my personal travel notes that detail what being on a journey really signifies for me: highlights from meaningful trips, sparks from travel mentors and real-life “on the road” companions, the tools that make up my “mindset carry-on,” as well as traveler anecdotes, vignettes, lists and suggestions for delving into more heightened and satisfying travel moments.

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