Traveling in Italy
We leave for Italy in a few days, and in an unexpected turn of events, I’ve become more the planner and Michael has become… remarkably relaxed about it. This will not be a quick trip, nor a checklist of cities, but an extended time set aside to live, if only briefly, in a place neither of us has experienced before.
For all the miles Michael has traveled over the years, this will be his first time in Italy. Mine too. That alone gives this trip a different kind of weight. There’s no returning to something familiar, no comparison point to fall back on. Everything will be a new shared experience, including the language, the pace, and the rhythm of daily life. Our anniversary is this month, and Italy feels like exactly the right place to celebrate our marriage and this season.
Traveling in Retirement
Traveling in retirement has already started to reveal something about each of us. Michael has settled into it with a kind of ease I both admire and study. He’s content to let things unfold, to take each day as it comes, to trust that wherever we land will be enough. There’s a steadiness to that.
I am managing it a little differently. I need a few anchors. Not a rigid plan, but something to hold onto, like where we’re staying, how we’re getting there, what the next step is. Just enough structure to feel grounded, so I can actually enjoy what’s in front of me. It’s a different approach, and somewhere along the way, without really deciding to, we seem to have traded roles.
Changing Roles
For most of our twenty years together, Michael did the research, made the reservations, and put together a file with everything we needed. That was how he traveled in business, and it worked well for him. He held things steady, set the pace, including “airport mode”, and made sure the details were covered. I threw a few things into my suitcase, grabbed a Rick Steves travel book to wherever we were going, and followed him into the great unknown, so to speak.
Now, it’s shifting.
He’s the one at ease with the unknown, and I’m the one building spreadsheets, researching data plans, and booking the VRBOs and hotel rooms. I have a Rick Steves book on Italy, but now I’m actually reading it before we’re standing in the middle of a city we’ve never been to. Michael packed in about an hour. I’ve been assembling and editing clothing capsules for days, while deciding which, and how many, pairs of shoes I can fit into my suitcase allotment.
Stepping into Italy
There will be places waiting for us, an apartment tucked into a hillside, a room overlooking a street we’ve never walked, a beautiful vineyard tour hosted by a lovely family of wine growers and makers, trains carrying us from one region to another. Those are my anchors. And in between them, there will be space to wander and to let a day unfold without needing to control it. That’s where Michael finds his rhythm.
We’re not going to see everything, even with the Rick Steves book in hand. Instead, with extra unhurried days, we’re going to step into Italy one place at a time and see what it gives us. And, somewhere between Michael’s ease and my need for structure, we believe just being together will be what moves us in the direction of a rhythm that belongs to both of us.