Raised in the wild mountains and shadowed valleys of eastern Kentucky and southern West Virginia, and being yet another soul meandering through a challenging childhood in a heavily impoverished region, I didn’t grow up traveling. In fact, as a child, the word “travel” conjured images of far-off places unreachable for me. And so, from a very young age, I learned the importance of appreciating, and even romanticizing, where you live. I hiked almost-invisible trails, waded in minnow-full creeks, noted what was in bloom, shrugged off my aversion to roadside stands, and enjoyed my grandfather’s small home orchard while attempting to not sprain an ankle sliding on an apple.

Though I’ve since lived in other states and regions, and have been fortunate to do much more traveling than I once did, I have continued to carry with me that habit of appreciating each and every place I visit, even if it’s just right down the street. I’ve come to call this enthusiastic and savoring method of exploration awefaring. You can truly find something to awe you almost everywhere, and I am grateful for that.

My husband, Andrew, and I once owned and stewarded a small farm in central Virginia, and though we enjoyed it well enough, we kept traveling to New England, dreaming of the day we would live in the region that called to us–the region that awed us the most. In early 2020, as the world was shutting down around all of us and it seemed that everything was in question, the stars aligned for us to move to a charming-as-all-get-out historic town in the Connecticut River Valley, where we still live, and where we still feel a sense of awe every single day. Even after this time, we still feel as if we are on vacation. And we truly couldn’t ask for more than that.

In this space, you’ll find reminiscences of previous travels, stories from daytrips around New England, recollections of explorations further afield, and other various forms of awefaring–even if it’s just via the printed page.

I consider this space to be a virtual front porch of sorts, a place to share stories and toast our virtual glasses to what lights us up within this world. Thank you for being here, whether as a quick out-of-towner or a neighbor who stops in regularly. You are welcome all the same.

Happy awefaring. May you always find awe, and it you.
-Lara