the why of the thing

I have friends who have created blogs to post a picture a day from their travels through life. Sometimes the photos are mundane or boring, sometimes they are silly or staged, some days they are even forgotten. The days when the photo really captures the person's life, gives a slice of the world through their eyes, however, are momentous. Every time I come across these photo blogs I feel inspired to add it to my bucket list. As I made my triumphant return from my parent's rambler in Bothell to my new digs in the Windy City I even vowed to start one of my own to no avail. I can blame this failure on a number of things - my lack of a smartphone capable of taking and posting pictures directly on the internet, my laziness, and the fact that life got so busy so quickly that this great idea got lost in the shuffle. But I think I know now the real reason I let it fall by the wayside - Chicago wasn't a new enough adventure for me. I'd been there and done that all before in the 4 years I called Loyola's lakeshore campus my home. I didn't feel the need to record my daily life because for the most part I was going back to old haunts. You can only find amusement in so many late night travels on the Red Line to want to capture the moments forever in blog history.

But my next adventure, well that's a horse of a different color. In a few short weeks I will be packing my adult life yet again, loading it all onto a truck, and driving north in search of a brand-spanking-new life. Destination: Twin Cities. Reason: University of Minnesota Grad School - MA in Higher Education. Goal: never let myself forget to have fun with life, every day. This blog will hopefully help in that endeavor, forcing me to observe the world around me, never take any moment for granted, and crossing some things off my bucket list along the way. I can't promise I won't have forgotten days, or those days where my life is pretty rote and therefore afford nothing more than a picture of good food or a pretty tree. But I can promise that I will live each day to the fullest and try my hardest to become an adopted Minnesotan, sharing my first glorious year in the land of 10,000 lakes ONE PICTURE AT A TIME.

countdown to DAY ONE: 26 days.