LISA |
But that’s not me. That has NEVER been me.
A nomadic childhood
Some of it was by circumstance. The fact is, I never even had a chance to live in one place my entire life. My dad was an accountant for GTE (and various evolutions), so by the time I was born, Number 3 of an eventual eight kids in an Irish/Italian/German/French, very Catholic family, the brood had already moved a couple of times. I started life in Williamsport, PA, my parents’ hometown, but only after they spawned their first couple of kids while living in New Cumberland, PA. We were in Billtown long enough for my parents to have me and my brother Michael before we were on the road again.
Warren, Pennsylvania. Syracuse, New York. Littleton, Massachusetts. Higganum, Connecticut. Mt. Laurel, New Jersey, where I finished high school and went off to Glassboro State College (now Rowan University) in South Jersey.
A nomadic adulthood
I got a job in the news department of WMZQ, a Top 40 country radio station, and then at the Associated Press, which was the largest news organization in the world. As soon as I saved enough to move out of my parents’ house, I moved into DC, and then to Arlington, VA. Living in Washington was a fascinating experience, but I found a culture of pursuit of status and government bureaucracy a bit stultifying and champed at the bit to leave.
Traveling woman
I started traveling. I visited San Francisco, England, Scotland, France and Switzerland. I backpacked through the Loire Valley and southern France. I joined the Ski Club of International Journalists and skied in Colorado, Italy and Spain.
Turning point
When I was 30, I decided it was time to pursue work abroad. An opening came up on AP’s World Desk in New York, the news agency’s way station to becoming a foreign correspondent. I considered a stint in New York a necessary evil to reach my goal - it would be crowded and loud, all skyscrapers and their shadows, with no nature in which to recharge. I would hate it.
Instead I fell in love
I fell in love with Central Park |
Three and a half years later, I was posted to Puerto Rico as a foreign correspondent covering the Caribbean islands. I had finally done it!
But oops, love
Alas, love interfered with my “travel the world” dreams in the form of Bob Greenawalt, a fellow adventurer whom I met a few months before I was posted to PR. Bob also had lived in many places, including Germany, while serving as an officer in the US Army. He followed me to Puerto Rico, but there was no work for a high-powered IT consultant on that perennial depressed island. So after a couple years we returned to NYC, a city we adored that offered employment for us both.
We got married and started a family. The adventure of parenting two gifted, autistic kids kept our feet on the ground for a while.
But after a decade or so in Manhattan and nearby Mamaroneck, the 2008 recession hit and Bob lost his job. We packed up the kids and the cats and headed across the country to the rugged mountains and of Colorado.
And that’s where we’ve been for almost 10 years. We’ve cycled up mountain passes, camped beside lakes, skied down black diamonds, hiked 14ers and drunk our fill of what this state has to offer. But the last kid has graduated from high school, and the next adventure awaits.
Life is short. The world is big. Let’s go!
What a wonderful, exciting, spirt-filled life you two are leading. Carolee
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