The world

“Whoa!” Eloise gasped at the sunlight filtering down through afternoon clouds napping around the mountains, shining off Enchanted Lake like a coin.

“What do you see, Eloise?” I asked.

“I see the world!”

I wasn’t sure the kids were careful enough to not fall off all the precipitous drops along the ridge line (and there were more than I ever noticed when hiking without them), but in that moment I knew we’d made the right choice—to step out on unstable ground, to try something that scares us, to pursue new vistas.

After some chaos and confusion, we have written orders to NATO in Brussels, Belgium, arriving late fall. So we’re all learning French and soaking in all the Hawaii we can.