We’d hardly been traveling for more than a couple of days when I settled into the feeling that I’ve come to know and love so well. We were on the hunt for food—a perpetual one when you’re on the move—and I thought to myself… Ah, yes. This is what I love about travel. The way the world expands and contracts simultaneously.

Somehow, precisely as the world gets physically bigger—as you see new things and discover new places—the world also shrinks down into a microcosm of itself. The simplest things become your entire focus. The preoccupation with getting (or fixing!) a cup of coffee can become an entire obsession.

When we arrived in the Albayzin in Granada, we went almost immediately on the search for a grocery store (see the note above about the perpetual hunt for food—I must’ve been a major part of a hunter/gather society in a previous life).  The first couple of times we went, we found everywhere to be closed. In fact, our first day here, a Sunday, we walked for hours only to discover that everything under the sun was closed for a day of rest. After spending years in South Carolina, I thought I knew a thing or two about the way places worked on Sundays, but that was nothing compared to here.

The next day, the hunt began again. This time, we discovered the quirky, unpredictable hours of the stores in the Albayzin (the oldest part of town, where TINY streets and grandiose walls reign). When we finally (post-siesta, at almost six in the evening) came across a store that was open, we discovered that you had to stand at the counter and actually ORDER what you wanted from the grocer. It was a truly bizarre experience that reminded me of novels I’ve read written in the 1800s. Still, despite the strangeness, we at least walked away with food that we could cook. We made our first meal at home that night. Success.

And so, the simplest daily chores become our total focus.

Simultaneously, the most breathtaking sights (the Alahambra is quite magnificent, and the Albayzin where we live is a UNESCO world heritage site) fill our days and expand our lives. It’s such an interesting, thrilling experience, made all the richer this time by getting to share our experiences with our precious daughter (who just turned one year old—how did that happen?!?). Though my heart is full, and I look forward to the joy of returning home (another great benefit of travel), I know it will be no time at all before I have the itch again to venture off in search of my next paradoxical adventure.

It's been over two weeks since I looked at a computer screen.

There was a time in my life when that would've been inconsequential, as well as a time when that was a simple fact (oh, those days of dial-up and busy phone lines and debating whether it was more important to access the mysterious Internet or talk to a friend), but these days, it seems that it's almost impossible to take a break from technology.

I didn't even take a REAL break. Even traveling, there's WiFi everywhere these days. It's easy to get a phone and a cheap phone card with texts, calling, and internet access. Google Voice has made talking to people everywhere easier than ever before. Despite weeks of traveling, I'm still remarkably connected to the rest of the world and my "normal" life. And yet, two weeks without my computer felt like a cooling breeze on a far-too-hot summer's day. It's with reluctance that I find myself with the screen before me. I'm not sure I was quite ready to return (says the girl who just signed a contract for a full-time tech job).

And yet the words tumble and fumble and bumble around in my head, clattering against crumbling walls, making it harder and harder to focus on the voices around me or the places I see. And so I find myself here, finally in front of a screen, pouring out a few of them, trying to clean up some of the clutter.

In my slight technology break, I've read a lot (on a Nook--I do understand the irony here, but man, does that save suitcase space and weight. Another phenomenal change that makes travel today so different from the way that it was before).

The more I read, the more words wash their way onto the cluttered shore of my mind. The author's words, the world's words, my brain's words. Every now and again, the world of the story becomes so prominent that I find my own inner world temporarily quieted (how I love those days!), but most of the time, those other worlds simply revitalize my own. This is equally good and bad. It's awesome to have ideas, to have the all important feeling of having something to say, and yet when that is not the focus of my life (which I find it never really is), it's mostly just a hassle.

But I love to read. And I love to get lost in books. And so I tolerate the inner turmoil that it sometimes creates when my mind gets so wound up.

My fingers can't keep up, and yet I haven't even said anything of substance thus far.

So I'll say simply that I'm happy to be reading. And I guess I'm ready to do some more writing. The summer sprawls before me with its promise of time (albeit a small amount--little fractions of days--considering the way that each day divides into portions). I find myself eager to make the most of it.

I'll write more when I figure out what it is I want to say. Something about travel. Something about life. Something about where to go from here...