Walk. Just walk.

There are a million fitness bros on the internet trying to sell you on bone broth and intermittent fasting and the evils of seed oils. F*&k that. 🙄

Just take a walk. Every day.

Start there. 🚶🏽‍♀️🌳🚶🏿

I’ve got a thing lately for urban design — in particular, the power of walkable communities. Living in Europe has stoked this fire. 🔥

One of the fascinating tidbits I’ve learned is that Americans often

1) Romanticize their college life — because it was the one time they lived in an actual walkable community with everything they needed and their best friends within a few minutes’ stroll, and

2) Yearn for the magic and charm of the vacations they experienced in walkable European cities like Paris or Barcelona or Prague or even, gulp, Disney World. Do you know what made them feel so magical? The mixed-use zoning that allows for cafes, apartments, and businesses to occupy the same block.

Did you feel it trick-or-treating last night? 🎃👻🍬 How great it felt to walk around your neighborhood and see people out and about and breathe the crisp autumn air and crunch leaves on the sidewalk alongside your littles and be in your body instead of strapped into an isolated metal bubble on wheels?

There’s wonder and wellness and connectivity in walking. Not to mention the power to save the planet. 🌎

It’s simple and accessible and you can do it with people you love. Or listen to a podcast and feed your brain and your spirit while you’re at it.

Our bodies are designed for this. Trust them.

You don’t have to pay for some expensive gym.

Being well — being every day embodied, out in the world, sharing space and breath and nature — doesn’t have to cost a dime.

Your body is the site of liberation

Everywhere you look right now you can find @thenapministry and her new book, “Rest Is Resistance: A Manifesto” — and I f**king LOVE it. ✨⚡️💫

Atlanta’s self-proclaimed “Nap Bishop” Tricia Hersey is splashed all over the pages of the NYT (and is now a bestseller!) and you’ll find her making the podcast rounds, too.

I couldn’t love her message more. Hersey weaves together

✨ Black liberation theology
✨ Womanist theory and praxis
✨ A critique of capitalism
✨ White supremacy
✨ The legacy of slavery
✨ Grind culture
✨ Commodification
✨ Our bodies as a site of resistance and liberation
✨ The notion of enoughness
✨ Why urgency’s a myth
✨ Imagination
✨ Creativity
✨ Silence
✨ The history of labor
✨ Community care vs self care
✨ The inherent divinity and goodness of every body (yours too)

And so much more. 🔥 Check out her recent interview with Glennon Doyle for a great introduction.

Love the ways in which Hersey has combined her theological training as an M.Div with performance art and community care. It’s just *chef’s kiss*. Inspired interdisciplinary work that the world needs so much. 💫⚡️✨

Chilly cobblestone moments

This morning my little family rolled out of bed and pulled on clothes we’d actually ironed and I applied once-a-year makeup and wore a real bra and not leggings (!!) to meet up with the always-wonderful Suzy Lou Photography for our annual family photos. 

(This is a quick behind-the-scenes shot from last year’s in the Alt Stadt.)

We met Suzy the first fall we’d moved here, back in 2018, when we’d only lived in Basel a few months and we weren’t sure how long we’d actually get to stay. The cityscape along the Rhine was the main character that year, and ever since, we’ve discovered different urban corners to create a visual history as our little guy grows (and as my husband and I both go grey).

It’s a pain in the ass to actually get properly dressed and put on lipstick and we’re often swearing at each other under our breath between snaps, but I’m so, so glad we’ve done this all these years. 

Expat life offers no illusion of permanence; everything about our Swiss reality could change in a heartbeat, depending on the job that allows us to stay. The rug can be pulled out from underneath it all at any moment. 

So I’m ever grateful to have taken the time for these chilly cobblestone shots over the years.

Thanks to Suzy for bringing Basel to life.