“We are butterflies who have been taught to become caterpillars.” So writes Dawna Markova author of some great books including “I Shall Not Die an Unlived Life.” It is an interesting observation.
What I so love about traveling to Orvieto and spending time there is that it helps us realize we are butterflies. Orvieto clears your [...]
Archive for December, 2008
Butterfly or Caterpillar
Posted in Meaning in Life, Orvieto Italy, Small group travel Italy on December 29, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Life is Tough
Posted in Living Slow on December 27, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Mark Twain made this comment. He said, “Life is tough. It takes up a lot of your time, all your weekends, and what do you get at the end of it? . . . Death, a great reward.”
That’s one way to look at it. As Christmas winds down and we learn that our consuming way [...]
Orvieto’s Gift
Posted in Orvieto Italy, Small group travel Italy on December 24, 2008 | 2 Comments »
This Christmas, as with any Christmas, we take so much joy in giving – and receiving. Orvieto’s people, the Orvietani, are giving us much this year. We have been visiting Orvieto every year since 2003. Slowly, we have built relationships into what are now deep friendships with everyone from the mayor, to agency directors, to [...]
Third Places in Italy
Posted in Meaning in Life, Orvieto Italy, Small group travel Italy, Travel Information on December 22, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Ray Oldenburg in his book “The Great Good Place“, argues that the neutral places we come together, such as downtown, coffee houses, bars and post offices, are tremendously important for us as people and for our society. They provide the place of interchange where we build ties to each other and our community, giving us [...]
High Tech – High Touch
Posted in Learning Vacations, Life, Living Slow, Orvieto Italy, Slow travel vacations, Small group travel Italy, Technology on December 17, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Back in 1982 John Naisbit wrote Megatrends. There have been sequels and knock offs, but this was the original. One of his megatrends was that we were going to become more high technology and that it would lead us to want more social interaction – high touch.
We have undeniably become more high tech. It is [...]
Finding Meaning
Posted in Life, Living Slow, Meaning in Life, Orvieto Italy on December 14, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
An editorial writer in the paper this morning talked about his having 3 weeks of vacation that he would lose this year. He managed to squeeze two days off this past week and spent it with his twin grandchildren. He found great meaning in those two days – particularly when he returned to find that [...]
Three Cups of Tea
Posted in Life, Living Slow, Orvieto Italy, Slow travel vacations, Small group travel Italy on December 12, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
In the true story of American Greg Mortenson’s amazing drive to build schools in the remote Hindu Kush region of Pakistan and Afghanistan, recounted in Three Cups of Tea, Mortenson described life’s most important lesson for him. The lesson came from the leader of the first town in which he built a school – a [...]
More TV Watched by the Unhappy
Posted in Life, Orvieto Italy, Slow travel vacations, Small group travel Italy on December 7, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
A recent article in the New York Times cited a study which showed that happy people watch less TV then unhappy folks. What do the happy do? They socialize.
So what does this have to do with our trips to Italy? Well, a lot actually. One of the reasons we love Italy so much is the [...]
Boomers Lead
Posted in Learning Vacations, Life, Orvieto Italy, Slow travel vacations, Small group travel Italy on December 4, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Baby boomers are due to recapture what they started back in the 60’s and 70’s. I have believed this for the last 6 years or so. The idealism and desire to change the world was not lost. It was postponed.
A recent book, while not really dealing with this, hints at it. The book, “A Whole [...]
Our Youth Leads
Posted in Culture, Orvieto Italy, Slow travel vacations, Small group travel Italy, Travel Information on December 2, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
One last entry on Zogby’s “The Way We’ll Be”. Thank God for today’s youth who are leading us baby boomers down the very path we set for ourselves but somehow got off. They are an inspiration.
Zogby calls them the first global generation. They are 18 – 29 and have a passport. They are demanding a [...]
