Seven months on the road this week with a summer in Canada ahead!

Spot a typo? That’s very-human me doing my best! (Such as last week’s newsletter when I said “Happy April!")

Thank you for being here. I appreciate your time and attention in this 10x-speed-treadmill world.

To kick things off, something to consider (via Mark Manson):

SIX COMMON LIES WE TELL OURSELVES

1. “If I had more time, I would do the thing.”

2. “If I could just have that, then my life would be amazing.”

3. “If I tell them this, then they will finally change.”

4. “Everything is perfect/ruined.”

5. “I can’t live without the thing.”

6. “I know what I’m doing.”

In case you missed it: Last time I wrote about my three-week trip through Puglia in Italy.

Retirement is a relationship problem

The single biggest predictor of whether your retirement is brilliant or bleak has almost nothing to do with your portfolio. It’s your relationships.

So says this financial planner in this excellent newsletter from Humans vs. Retirement. Here are some paraphrased concepts that stood out for me:

1. Chronic loneliness is roughly as toxic to your body as smoking 15 cigarettes a day.

2. Good relationships keep us happier and healthier. Loneliness kills. The people most satisfied in their relationships at 50 were the healthiest at 80. The lonely ones died younger. The quality of those relationships predict your health, happiness and lifespan more reliably than your cholesterol, your income, or your genes.

3. Gray divorce (the weird term for splitting up after 50) is on the rise. Women instigate over 60% of them. But retirement doesn’t cause it. Retirement just strips away the structure that was holding up a marriage that nobody wanted to look at too closely.

   

4. After leaving the workforce, you can rebuild identity, purpose, and structure. Sure, it’s hard…but rebuilding relationships is either far harder or straight up impossible.
   

   The work friendships you thought were strong were actually friendships of proximity. (Even I, a major extrovert, only sporadically stay in touch with two people from my work days.)
   

   Meanwhile, the people you pushed to the fringe of your life while you were grinding—old friends, siblings, your spouse—got on with lives that didn’t include you. You can’t just step back in at 65 and expect to pick up where 1996 left off.

5. What you CAN do

   1. Audit your actual friendships.

   2. Call one of them this week. Not text. Call.

   3. Have one honest conversation with your partner/spouse about what you actually want the coming decades to look like.

   4. Join something where you’re the new person. So many groups out there!

   5. If you’re a man, find the one friend you feel ok contacting and start the awkward work of rebuilding an adult male friendship. It will feel weird. Do it anyway.

BOOM. Mic drop wisdom from a financial planner. Definitely read his entire essay.

Just say no to hoarding-type scrolling

Have you ever saved something from the internet as a “read later” item, then felt the weight of it? Another to-do, yayyyy.

Me too. So much great shit on the internet—funny, helpful, full of wisdom!

Oh, and overwhelming at times.

But for the past couple of years, instead of inbox zero meaning I have to ingest everything, I give myself permission to delete them. It’s so freeing.

I think of it as scooping a cup into the internet river instead of diverting it into a reservoir where I save everything. If newsletters, podcasts, or videos sit in my inbox and I don’t have time in a few days to read them, ZAP, byeeeee.

Harjas Sandhu’s essay and label for this rang true for me: “The hallmark of hoarding-type scrolling is saving good posts for later instead of reading them now.”

Oliver Burkeman followed up with an essay about the exciting power of immediacy versus the dread of, “oh, I’ve gotta go through my saved links, ugh…”

“It generates a huge backlog to slog through – so that even if you do get around to reading or watching, you’re no longer responding from the place of aliveness and excitement that first drew you in, but from a duller sense of obligation to clear the backlog, extract the important bits, and move on to something else.”

Something to consider next time you’re saving something to read, listen, or watch later.

Traipsing Tidbits

A few things that I’ve enjoyed (which I insist you not save for later):

1. This cybersecurity expert says to stop using your physical credit card and switch to a digital wallet like Apple Pay so that merchants never see the full number.

2. Summertime! Fun…usually. Can you spot a drowning person?

3. Q: How rich are you? (You can’t mention money.)

Traipsing About is motoring onward. But first, a quote for the road:

“When you get to my age, you’ll really measure your success in life by how many of the people you want to have love you that actually do love you.”

That’s the ultimate test of how you have lived your life. The trouble with love is that you can’t buy it. You can buy sex. You can buy testimonial dinners. You can buy pamphlets that say how wonderful you are. But the only way to get love is to be lovable.

It’s very irritating if you have a lot of money. You’d like to think you could write a check: I’ll buy a million dollars’ worth of love. But it doesn’t work that way.”

-Warren Buffett

Onward,

Dakota

P.S. I want to see this giant airport clock with people as minute and hour hands.

Thank you for being here. I appreciate your time and attention in this endless news cycle crush of a world.

Today I’m coming at ya from the stunning landscapes of Banff National Park. More to come there, but first, more to relate from my recent trip to Italy!

In case you missed it: Last time I wrote about being married to the CEO (and 20 years of marriage!).

Highlights from a road trip through Puglia

For my three-week road trip with my mom through Puglia (Italy’s bootheel), I rented a sexy Opel Corsa rocketship car in Rome and hit the road.

After my solo time in Rome, we kicked things off visiting the two towns of my great-grandparents, then headed south. Here are some highlights from a bonding, fabulous trip together.

Taking the backroads

Sure, there are autostrada that blast through Puglia, but No Highways mode on Google Maps opens up a whole other world. Some “roads” felt more like former (or current) horse cart lanes, but that was part of the fun.

Random stops along the way (aided by Claude!)

I don’t use AI to write this newsletter, but it’s great for travel help. Pre-trip and in Italy, Anthropic’s Claude helped a LOT. Even mid-drive, I’d ask “what is interesting between these two cities?” and stop somewhere.

I’d also take photos of interesting statues, features, landscapes, ask questions, dig for more context and connection between people and places. It felt like having my own tour guide! (And yes, I probably “learned” some things that were straight-up hallucinations. But hey, I’ll never know! #cheapentertainment)

Cave dwellings in Matera

I considered avoiding Matera because it’s touristy, but I’m so glad I didn’t! There are reasons why tourists visit certain places and this was worth it. Inhabited since prehistory (7,000 B.C.! WTF!) and continuously occupied ever since, the city's residents originally lived in limestone caves.

If you visit, get up early or walk around after dinner to avoid the busy days when tour buses roll in. (This held true anywhere popular that we went).

Land of trulli

As a counterpoint, the town of Alberobello felt like a complete disaster of a tourist swarm to me. The draw of the place are trulli, cone-shaped houses with limestone shingle roofs. They’re neat...but the trulli area was a miasma of trinkets and tourists.

We beat a quick path outta there to Locorotondo, which was chill and had many trulli scattered around the countryside. It was a perfect base for four days exploring the area.

Otranto: Medieval castle and beautiful coastline

With a medieval castle overlooking the Adriatic, this was a favorite. Night walks along the waterfront, narrow city streets, and just a great vibe!

Tips for traveling with a parent (and vice versa)

My mom and I both had friends incredulously ask us, “You’re traveling for three weeks together?!” Sure, we hadn’t voyaged together before other than as a whole family, but a number of things helped make our trip a success:

1. We talked through what we wanted the trip to look like, but then I took the lead and planned/booked the entire thing. My mom happily went along, so we didn’t have any of the drama of people wanting to do different things.

   

2. I booked 2-room apartments for us during the trip, which allowed time apart to chill out, read, catch up on communication, and follow different sleep schedules.

3. I leaned into making the trip about my mom and her interests. Ceramics, madonnas in churches, street markets. Being interested in what she was into made those things interesting! She was, in turn, cool with me taking time to call Chelsea or handle stuff with our rental.

   

4. We avoided wall-to-wall days full of activities. Each afternoon, we’d take a siesta. My mom might do yoga while I’d do a workout, or she’d do art while I played piano, or we might both take a nap.

   

5. Sometimes I’d split off and go for a morning hike or an evening walk after my mom had called it a night.

6. We were careful to keep NARG at bay. My angry alter-ego shows up when I’m hangry, so we always had energy bars or focaccia for me to munch on. In three weeks, I only snapped at my mom once while trying to find parking on an empty stomach. Hey, small wins!

These things created the conditions for lots of laughs, stories from the past, and an all-around fabulous time together. I’d totally do it again.

Traipsing About is heading even further north into the Rockies! But first, a quote for the road:

“The two risks of travel are disappointment and transformation. The fear you’ll be the same person when you go home, and the fear you won’t.”

-Kate Harris, Lands of Lost Borders (a stunning book about biking the Silk Road)

Onward,

Dakota

Today is my 44th birthday and we’re up in the Canadian Rockies! I’m very stoked to spend the entire summer exploring Alberta and British Columbia while camping with Chelsea’s bro and his lady.

On the drive up, we passed the headwaters of the Columbia River, which had a sign about a farmer along with an excellent quote:

It has been said that to be happy, you only need three things—something to do, someone to love, and something to look forward to.

Which plays right into today’s theme…

In case you missed it: Last time I wrote about the surreal, movie-script visit I took to my great-grandfather’s village in Italy with my mom.

Note: My trip to Italy delayed finishing this post I’d intended for April, so I’m publishing it now!

Two decades of cannonballing

Twenty years ago, Chelsea boarded a plane from Portland to Prague to meet me for a month-long first date in Europe.

We still laugh about why she did that, flew across an ocean to meet me after a series of conversations on MSN Messenger and Skype.

To be fair, she did some research. While we’d never met, I’d lived with her brother in college. Her dad had been my high school chemistry teacher.

His guidance: “Dakota gets what he wants.”

Her mom: “He likes to cannonball into swimming pools.”

At least one of those things is true.

At the time, I was penny pinching during a year traveling overseas. I had a vivacious young woman coming to meet me, so I went big with accommodations: couchsurfing for free!

As a testament to our shared views on finances, Chelsea didn’t bat an eye at shared lodging in a studio apartment. Even though she had a cool job with an expense account, it somehow made sense that my cheap ass wouldn’t book a hotel room.

I look back and shake my head at this idiocy, but that was young, thrifty Dakota. Now I’d drop at LEAST $25 on a shared hostel!

This was an exploratory first date. Sure, it was a month long, but if it didn’t work out, we’d still have a good time exploring eastern Europe. Chelsea even showed up with shirts labeled FUN and other entertaining items, including fake buck teeth.

Exploring Europe together

Our trip together had no agenda beyond getting to know one another. We took the train the wrong direction out of Cesky Krumlov, wandered cities and hiked mountains, rode buses and ferries around Croatia, ate a surprise dessert that some mysterious person bought for us in Rovinj, drove across Germany in a rented BMW with my friend Eric and a bushel of pastries…

Oh, and she and I fell in love.

This trip together set the tempo for our relationship. For our second date, she flew to Beijing to meet me (after I did the Trans-Siberian Railroad with my brother) and we traveled through China and SE Asia for a few months.

My impatience (especially when hungry) raised its ugly head when looking for restaurants with vegetarian options for her. She didn’t want to sleep in the dirtiest, cheapest hovels either, which was annoying.

Clearly, I was still learning to find middle ground with a partner.

After moving in with her in Portland, we were both in our 20s and working hard on careers. Our relationship was still fresh, evolving. Most conflicts centered around me wanting to change her. I can be *cough* a little intense about outdoor activity and wanted her to hike or bike like a maniac or rock climb with me.

Looking back, my relaxing that attitude over the years has transformed our partnership into a mostly peaceful one.

We balance each other well. In fact, if I’d coupled up with someone more like me—focused on physical activity, hard driving, a bit too much—I would have missed out on many experiences and activities. So many experiences and activities I treasure have sprung from her gentle nudges.

CEO vision

Oh what the hell, how about a list! Things Chelsea has initiated for us:

1. Saw a van in Colorado and kicked off our Sprinter life escapades.

2. Bike toured with girlfriends first and had the idea for our cross-US bike tour.

3. Wanted to downshift and stop in Bend after three years of van travels.

4. Bought me a piano out of the blue, kicking off my (second) love affair.

5. Did the initial research to confirm I could become an Italian citizen.

6. Got the wild ass idea to buy our Airstream trailer.

So many others, big and small, beyond that. I think of her as the CEO (ideas, vision) and me as the COO (make it happen).

Point me at something and I can create the structure, create the thing, from a DIY camper van to an Italian passport to WTF-traveling-with-a-trailer requires AND how to back it up without smashing things.

The next decade

Ten years ago, I wrote a post about our relationship, concluding with:

“What is a relationship but a compilation of the moments shared with someone you care about? I dream of the expanding landscape of our lives, how many more adventures we’ll have, and how much we’ll learn and explore together. We’re just getting started.”

In 2016, I had no idea that October would be the end of our van trip. That we’d land in Bend and experience all we did there, the awesome people, the ups and downs of life.

Throwing caution to the wind to meet in a foreign country continues to be a counter-intuitive kind of bedrock we’ve anchored to, an expression of how we want to live. Even as we modify how and why we travel, we both fondly remember that trip. (Even if we disagree on who pursued whom: she definitely was the pursuer. #MyblogMyrules)

Now we’re in another phase, footloose again, no plans past September. I have zero idea what our lives will look like in another five years, let alone ten. Maybe I’ll get really into playing the recorder! (<--relationship deal-breaker for Chelsea.)

Whatever comes our way, so long as we can continue to grow together, support one another’s passions, and encourage adventure, it doesn’t matter. We’ll figure it out.

Here’s to another decade of cannonballing!

Onward!

Dakota

Thank you for being here. I appreciate your time and attention in these information-overloaded times.

In case you missed it: Last time I wrote about kicking off a month-long trip to Italy with some solo time exploring Rome. More to come about my trip!

Digging for Italian roots

If I wrote a screenplay about me and my mom returning to her grandfather Annibale’s Italian village, it would feature random encounters with relatives, a hill town, classic Italian music (cue accordions!), old guys in piazzas, and pizza in the same piazzas.

Not very creative, right? Cheeseball!

Well, red line my first draft and tear up the second because that’s exactly what happened when we visited Sant’Agata di Puglia. As the magical moments stacked up during our four-day visit, I kept expecting to see hidden camera lenses jutting out from secret enclosures, Truman Show style.

Instead, it was just me, the Paparazzi Figlio, following my mom around during our first mother-son road trip.

The quintessential Italian hill town

Driving up the steep hill into Sant’Agata, my mom spotted a statue of the Madonna on the side of the road. I was hangry and late for our arranged check-in, but I pulled over anyway. She started gesturing for me to get out...well look at that, the statue was commissioned by Lucia Marchitelli, one of our relatives!

Our charmed visit to Sant’Agata di Puglia was underway.

My great-grandfather was born in Sant’Agata in 1879, then left 27 years later in pursuit of a better life in America. Through his lineage, I was able to acquire Italian citizenship for me, my siblings, and my mom. I’d learned the language (very necessary for this visit, as it turned out!) and we’d talked about visiting the village together ever since to close the loop.

Home for our stay: L’Antico Monastery, a 500-year-old Catholic monastery restored in brilliant fashion as a hotel. Original marble floors, classy decor, delicious breakfasts, and expansive countryside views were the perfect base for our stay in the town.

The serendipity came at us fast. During our first evening, my mom said (in Italian) to the first woman we passed on the streets, “I’m a Marchitelli. Do you know any?” The lady did a doubletake, said “But...I’m a Marchitelli!”

We’d just met a cousin, Fiorina. After a warm conversation, she hugged us, telling me “Ti abbraccio come un figlio” (I embrace you as a son).

A few steps later, we found ourselves in the piazza in the center of town overlooking the green hills. It was full of people, including young boys kicking soccer balls, old guys strolling back and forth in a line, parents with strollers, and a line of guys sitting on a bench near the edge.

One of them had a boombox, which was playing Funiculì, Funiculà, the famous Italian tune. My mom was radiant, just soaking in the energy, and the men grinned as she spontaneously sang and danced to the music. I checked for hidden cameras; surely this scene wasn’t real.

Shortly after, we chatted with a group of people standing outside a pizzeria. One of them, Rocco, had grown up in Sant’Agata and had a career at the local Fiat factory. He was a huge fan of Harley Davidson motorcycles and had ridden them all over Europe. Hearing that we were searching for Marchitellis, his eyes brightened and he said, “follow me!”

Down the narrow main street we went, ducking into doorways whenever a car passed the definitely-not-designed-for-cars cobbled lane. A few hundred feet down the road, Rocco pointed to a doorway. Above it, faintly etched in the stone, was an emblem and the words MARCHITELLI, 1849.

Finally, the pizzeria opened. (7:30 pm; how many times did the hunger monster hit me at 6:30 in Italy when everything was closed?!) Like many of the buildings in the town, the restaurant was built into the raw rock of the hill, almost cave-like.

Inside, a kids’ birthday party was raging. And I do mean raging: the parents lounged in the back of the pizzeria chatting while the kids rampaged around, eating an occasional french fry to refuel their engines before spinning in circles again.

We were beat after a full day, so back to the monastery we went to sleep like monks, but on soft, comfy beds.

Chasing the Marchitellis

For our first full day in Sant’Agata, we started off with a marvelous breakfast at the monastery. Vegan croissants and yogurt for me, plus the local offering of crusty bread with tomatoes and olive oil. I, No Coffee Guy, even drank a sugary cappuccino.

First stop that morning: ancestry research at the municipality office. Our fixer, Rocco, met us at the office.

There, the employee pulled out the giant paper registry where all the town’s births were recorded. Hey, there’s Marchitelli scribbled in fine Italian script from 1879, along with a description of the address!

After a few minutes of debate and magnifying glasses, the guy and Rocco decided that the address read “la traversa sotto la piazza,” so we were off to find my great-grandfather’s house on the path below the square.

And there it was, THE Marchitelli property, the start of my mom’s side of the family.

Later, my mom and I explored the city and stumbled upon a little weedy plaza dedicated to Gino Marchitelli, another cousin. He’d documented the local Sant'Agatese dialect by interviewing farmers and townspeople over a seven-year period, creating a 7,000-word dictionary.

Speaking of the dialect, later I asked Rocco to demonstrate it. He said a sentence of about 10 words in Italian; I understood him perfectly. Then he said it in dialect. I only understood one word! The local is similar to Neapolitan, which isn’t even considered Italian by linguists—it’s classified as another language.

Another time, we explored the beautiful church in town. My mom spent a long time sitting and thinking about her mom, my wonderful Italian grandmother who always asked if I’d gone to Easter Mass. (Sorry Grandma!)

How did this little town of 1,700 people afford such a big, fancy church? I suppose decades and decades ago, when the town’s population was over 10,000, there were a lot more resources. The population drain from Southern Italy sent millions of people to the U.S. during my great-grandfather’s lifetime, and even today young people continue to emigrate.

Case in point: a young woman at a pizzeria who said she loves Sant’Agata, but that there is no opportunity there. She’s heading to medical school in Rome, a five-hour drive north. I pictured her sweet, country personality in the cacophony of the big city, trading the familiar faces of a small town for the isolation and pressure of a metropolis.

Our third day, the skies opened up and it raiiined and rained. Over meals and hangtime in the monastery, my mom spun stories from her past. We’ve spent lots of time together over the years, but something about traveling together for the first time, especially in a distant foreign land, really dredged up her memories.

During a rain break, we headed out into town, only to get chased under an eave during a downpour. I glanced at the apartment building; well look at that, two Marchitellis on the buzzer call buttons! I was feeling brave and called Vincenzo Marchitelli, but sadly only chatted with his daughter.

My mom and I sat in a cafe and enjoyed some hot beverages as the rain hammered down outside. She shared many more stories of her time as a student in Italy 50 years ago, tales of being young and free. Rain, smain. It didn’t matter where we were or what we were doing, this was special mother-son time together.

One last evening

Our final night in town, we climbed back up to the piazza. Two kids kicked a soccer ball; a line of old guys enjoyed their ritual of the evening passeggiata.

It felt timeless, the same worn cobblestones trodden by different feet over centuries. I spotted a few other familiar faces, chatted with people. Four days here and, in a small way, we already felt embraced by the community.

As night approached, I climbed solo up the narrow, steep steps of the town to the castle at the top. Standing on the wall overlooking the little town, I could hear the hum of voices from the town square far below. The hills rolled off into the distance in the evening murk.

A bolt of connection to my great-grandfather Annibale struck me. A surreal feeling, standing there soaking it all up.

Somehow, he’d journeyed from rural Italy to New Jersey. Speaking zero English and with only $11 in his pocket, he’d started a new life and family that would include my grandma.

The courage he must have summoned! To leave the thrum and tight village life in the Italian hills and bid one final arrivederci to everyone in the village square. What did it feel like to hug his parents and say goodbye (forever, as it turned out), then traverse an ocean to an unknown new life?

At that moment, the church bells started clanging away. The same bells Annibale would have heard from the day he was born to his final night in Sant’Agata way back in 1906.

That span of 120 years felt like nothing, like he could walk up to the castle and greet me. After all the magic of the visit, it wouldn’t feel out of place one bit.

The church bells stopped clanging and I headed down through town. The script to my cheesy, too-perfect movie visit to Sant’Agata was complete.

Wassup, Traipser! Dakota here with Traipsing About, my AI-free newsletter exploring living an intentional life while reclaiming creativity as an adult. I spice things up with travel experiences, pictures and daily drawings.

Thank you for reading. I appreciate your time and attention in this tornado-at-your-front-door world.

***

Ciao from Italy! I’m over here for a month with a variety of exploits planned. Thanks to a generous friend who works as a flight attendant, I flew to Rome on free standby passes. While the anticipation of “will I get a seat” was strange, everything worked exactly as planned.

In case you missed it: Last time I considered the question “whose opinion are you living for?”

So much history

I’ll get this not-original observation out of the way: holy CRAP is the history in Rome deep.

Walking out of the antique instrument museum, I sat in front of a big ol’ church to eat a snack. What’s that big building? Oh, that was built in 220 AD by an emperor with a very Latin name. Biking along the Tiber River, there’s the island that is allegedly the founding place of Rome roughly forever years ago. No big deal.

To me, Rome’s magic lies in the contrast of old and new, layered, seething, pouring forth from tight alleys and bars and clubs, electronic music reverberating off walls 1,000 years old. Apple iPhone ads on churches, bus stops in front of 1,800-year-old city walls. History, discarded in a way, accommodated but progress moving forward.

There were water fountains always gushing, piles of scooters parked in a line (I pondered whether they would topple like dominoes), plus moss on the ancient cobblestones and gelato on every corner.

Everywhere I walked or biked, I stumbled upon history smashed up against modern life. And while I’ve witnessed this during my other trips to Europe, Rome turned my amazement up to 11.

A different angle of Italy

I’ve visited Italy one time before on a bike tour, but this was the first time since being recognized as an Italian citizen, getting a passport, and learning the language. Wow, did it change the experience in a positive way.

Mostly, my goal during this month is to just soak up the Italian vibe. To listen to how people talk, wander around, and speak in the native language as much as possible. Rome was no different.

Everywhere I went, I struck up conversations. Coffee bars, music performances, restaurants, parks. (I’m a menace.) The Romans have a soft accent, whereas I learned more national Italian with a sharp C, so tuning my ear took a bit (and continues!)

People adjusted in the same way I can understand a Southern U.S. accent. Pointing out that my accent is terrible helped to disarm people. We’d laugh and launch into various conversations.

I’ve talked about the normal stuff like where I’m from and my plans, but also about specific interests. Whether that’s at a coffee shop, intermission at a music performance, or working out with guys at an outdoor fitness area, I’ve dived in. Pointed questions about our president, plus long conversations about working remotely, the problems facing young people in Italy, and what it’s like to live here as an immigrant.

Did I screw up conjugations, words, adjective agreements? Yes. Will I continue to? Ohhh sure. I’m sure I sound strange, but as multiple people told me, “ti capisco bene.” (I understand you well.)

Taking it all in

The contrast of Rome compared to the wide-open natural spaces I’ve traveled in the past five months was wild. From Airstream life in the remote American west to the center of a bustling, noisy, dirty, rowdy city built on top of centuries of history!

Rather than scheduling myself silly, I opted to explore the city with a few linchpins based on my interest in music. My first night, I rode the bus up to a performance in the north of the city. The Musical Academy is from 1595; deep history, everywhere. Another night, I listened to Chopin played in a church. Wandering down to the Antique Instrument Museum generated its own adventures.

Another change this trip is traveling with a sketchbook. I loved just sitting and drawing in Rome. Whether on a bench, at a cafe or restaurant, or overlooking a vista, sketching the city in many different places was a real joy. It helps me slow down and see things in a way that I didn’t on past trips, even when I was taking lots of photographs. The slower the composition, the more I see.

A benefit of big cities: incredible food. I told Chelsea if I came back the same weight, it would mean I didn’t do Italy right! The plant-based restaurant options were extraordinary, so it’s a good thing I walked over 10 miles each day.

Just a quick dip

My stop in Rome felt like I barely skimmed away the cappuccino froth. In a place where you could spend a decade studying doorknockers and another studying church frescoes, in no way did I try to do everything or check off a specific list.

Sure, I saw the Colosseum in a bike-by, but I didn’t brave the crowds at the Vatican or elbow my way into the Pantheon. Maybe someday?

Meanwhile, I’ve got other plans for the remaining month in Italy.

Onward,

Dakota

Thank you for being here. I appreciate your time and attention in this tornado-at-your-front-door world.

In case you missed it: Last time I wrote about how our clock is running and what I’d do with only 10 years left.

This newsletter round, I’ve got a couple of concepts I’ve been rolling around in my brain, all mixed with pictures from Utah adventures. Here goes!

Pure independence

I’m a big fan of Morgan Housel, author of The Psychology of Money and other excellent finance books. From this excellent blog post: a simple formula for a pretty nice life is independence plus purpose.

These ideas stood out to me:

1. Independence does not mean you don’t care what anyone thinks of you. It means that you strategically decide whose attention you seek. Rather than trying to appease everyone (foolish, impossible) you select the life you want to live and focus your attention on a smaller group of people whose love and support you deeply desire.

2. If I can predict your views on one topic by hearing your views about another, unrelated topic, you are not thinking independently. Example: If your views on immigration allow someone to accurately predict your views on abortion and gun control, there’s a good chance you’re not thinking independently.

3. When you’re independent you feel less desire to impress strangers, which can be an enormous financial and psychological cost:

   1. Physical signaling (clothes, cars, homes, jewelry)

   2. Clout-chasing (desperate for social media engagement)

   3. Tribal signaling (political battles, status superiority, election bumper stickers)

   4. Moral signaling (everything is us-versus-them)

“There is only one success,” says poet Christopher Morley, “to be able to spend your life in your own way.”

Are you one of the few Americans who could really move to Europe?

Such a great post by an expat living in Lisbon. He poses 10 questions to ask yourself to help guide whether you could move to Europe (and probably most countries).

With an Italian passport in my pocket, I love pondering this kind of stuff. Here are my favorites from his questions, with some quick comments afterward:

1. Are you a Security or Discovery person? Do you like the same vacations and routines, or do you love spontaneity and exploration? Everyone falls somewhere on a spectrum here.

2. Are you prepared to live far away from friends and family. Moving abroad means losing the emotional support and comfort that comes from previous connections.

3. Are you prepared to accept a lower level of comfort and convenience? Same-day Amazon, ha! Costco, the store everyone dunks on but secretly loves? You’ll miss it. A/C everywhere, yeah right! The U.S. is the land of convenience (for better or worse) and Europe doesn’t operate that way.

   

4. Are you ready to make a massive investment in learning the language? It took me a couple of years of daily effort to speak Italian fairly well. After a year of study, Portuguese is still tying my brain in knots with the pronunciations! It takes work…that’s oh-so-satisfying, but real.

5. Have you done the research, figured out a residency path, and nailed down your finances to make it possible? Looots of logistics to consider, as my friend Don writes about in his and his wife’s experiences moving to Porto.

So much to consider! Could you do it??

Traipsing About is motoring onward. But first, a quote for the road…

It is easy in the world to live after the world’s opinion; it is easy in solitude to live after your own; but the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude.

Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Self-Reliance” (via the excellent book Vagabonding by Rolf Potts)

Onward,

Dakota

Thank you for being here. I appreciate your time and attention in this waterfall-on-your-head world. Today I’m coming at ya from Capitol Reef National Park, a little oasis tucked into the cliffs of Utah.

In case you missed it: Last time I wrote about our two months in Arizona, including favorite spots along the way.

How Many More Good Years?

Hiking through the hoodoos of Bryce Canyon this week, Chelsea asked me, “What would you do if you knew you only had 10 years left?”

Geez, I was just enjoying the view and she asks that?!

I kid, I kid. As good questions do, it kicked off a long, varied discussion about priorities, bucket lists, and goals.

Soon after, I read the article Your 12 Good Years by a financial planner. It leads off with a punch:

12 good years. That’s how long the average healthy 60-year-old has before their mobility, energy, and independence start to significantly decline.

Not before they die… before life gets noticeably harder. Before they have more time than they have energy.

He breaks things down. Instead of being careful when you retire, GET GOING.

Front-load your retirement. Not your spending, necessarily. But your experiences. Your energy. Your ambition.

The first 10-12 years of retirement should be the richest, fullest, most intentional years of your life. Not the most cautious. Not the most careful. The most alive.

Not that travel is the priority for everyone. Even at home, there's plenty worth pursuing if your bucket list includes things like:

• Actively volunteering or running for public office.

• Planting a monster garden.

• Training for a marathon or finally nailing that hard yoga pose.

• Learning a language or how to play an instrument.

• Mentoring younger people or teaching at a local college.

That’s just a quick brainstorm. Lots of ways to contribute, learn, explore and live!

We’re not 60 yet

All this still applies even for me and Chelsea in our 40s. Time and energy are precious. A lifetime of activity shows up in a sore back here, a tweaked hip there. Maybe I hit a few too many rock drops on my mountain bike in my 30s?

I’m also reminded constantly that life is fickle and there are no guarantees about any amount of years at any age. Curveballs have hit us, friends, parents. Is this just life past 40?

All this motivated us to jump into this mid-life break. It felt like an imperative, like we’d be messing up not to shake things up and hit the road.

As the brilliant writer Brenda Ueland says in If You Want to Write,

“The foolishness of all this living in the future! Like working very hard at something dull all your life so you can retire on plenty of money at eighty.”

Sure, mayyybe we run out of money later. However:

1. I know I’m going to die someday. 100% chance. (Don’t believe the live-forever tech bros.)

BUT

2. In the less-than-100% chance finances get tight later in life, we can live simply on very little and be quite happy. It feels like a super power to know finances don’t dictate our happiness beyond the basics of survival.

Given that, I’m going to enjoy this mid-life hiatus to the max so that I’m not kicking myself later in life thinking, “why didn’t I go do ______?”

Our next decade

Which brings us back to the hoodoos and our next ten years.

I briefly pondered Chelsea’s question, but the answers bubbled out easily. Time together. Travel. Exploring beautiful nature on foot and by bike. Writing. Mentoring. Studying piano, languages, and art while reading a ton. Spending time with family and friends. Staying physically strong and fit.

Above all, the time flexibility to feel unrushed and able to dive into whatever passion or project appeals to me.

Never too late

If you’re over 60, time isn’t up yet!

My 73-year-old mom just kicked off a major adventure by flying to Rome last week. She hasn’t traveled overseas for 50 years, but will spend the next YEAR in Italy and other European countries, a month here, a month there.

Intimidating idea? Oh yeah. Awesome adventure in one’s 70s? HELL yeah. Her friends are astonished. I’m so proud of her for making it happen.

Seize the years. Go go GO! We’re never too old, but the sooner we launch into the adventures of a lifetime that we’ve always dreamed of, home or away, the better.

Traipsing Tidbits

• So good: Retirement Plan, an Oscar-nominated 7-minute film.

• You don’t need to document everything.

• Definitely send this hilarious video to a bird watcher in your life.

Traipsing About is motoring onward from the Utah national parks (for now). But first, a quote for the road…

“One day you will wake up and there won’t be any more time to do the things you’ve always wanted. Do it now.”
— Paulo Coelho

Onward,

Dakota

P.S. Wow, this amazing drawing goes on and on (and in and out). Thanks Jesse!

Happy Friday the 13th, Traipser! Dakota here with Traipsing About, my AI-free newsletter exploring living an intentional life while reclaiming creativity as an adult. I spice things up with experiences, pictures and drawings from traveling in our Airstream.

Thank you for being here. I appreciate your time and attention in this facepunch-a-minute tumult of a world and hope today’s newsletter helps quiet that noise for a bit.

In case you missed it: Last time I wrote about being an Illuminator versus a Diminisher (and shared a ton of photos from beautiful Sedona).

Two months living the Arizona life

I’m usually a trees and mountains guy, but I’ve gotta say that a banquet of saguaro cactus and desert vistas this winter really hit the spot.

Rolling in from California’s Anza-Borrego Desert, we headed way down toward the Mexican border. Since then, we’ve parked the trailer in just seven other stops in two months. #slowtravel (at least for us!)

Compared to van travel, we’re staying in a lot more paid camping situations, which I don’t mind a bit for the convenience and security, plus not having to crash around on back roads searching for free spots.

The slower pace has supported our other life goals as well: we’ve stayed on top of physical therapy, cooked healthy plant-based food from scratch, connected with friends and family, and kept after creative pursuits. There are tradeoffs (see my post on maintenance), but this travel style is working great for us.

Here’s the list of our stays, all of which I heartily endorse:

• Organ Pipe National Monument: remote camping with trails out the door

• Desert Trails RV Park (west of Tucson: a well-landscaped, quiet artist and musician’s RV park tucked up against Saguaro National Park. Coyotes howling at sunset!

• Catalina State Park (NE of Tucson): people book this park a year out for a reason—the views and access to the Santa Catalina Mountains are fabulous. We scored two weeks of cancellations and dug our time there.

• Lost Dutchman State Park (east of Phoenix): This campground is up against the Superstition Wilderness with stunning views and fantastic access. We didn’t drive once in a week stay!
  

• Sedona Hipcamp: for two weeks, we parked a few miles west out of the Sedona fray in a quiet neighborhood, but still close to amazing hikes and riding, plus trails out the door into national forest.

• Dead Horse State Park (Cottonwood): a few days enjoying the marvelous birds at the nearby lagoons.

• Point of Rocks RV park (Prescott): one of our favorite camp spots! We scored a site overlooking the granite rock fields near Wilson Lake. Sadly, I didn’t ride as much as I wanted to (see below).

• Grand Canyon’s Trailer Village: stay in the quiet, spacious gravel sites on the east side. One mile to the rim of the canyon via a paved bike path. Get 200’ from the main viewpoints and it’s quiet and stunning!

Overall, I can say without any doubt that state parks in AZ are nice! Clean, quiet and with spacious sites—we totally loved them.

Also, we found that everywhere we visited had respectful, quiet snowbirds who were there enjoying nature and some winter warmth. I suspect it won’t be our last winter jaunt in Arizona.

A pollen surprise

The only blemish on our Arizona time was a massive pollen dump in Prescott that destroyed me with allergies I didn’t even know I had. Instead of mountain biking my face off, I wound up with bronchial wheezing, sore throat, headache, all of it.

Allergy meds did nothing for me, but a visit to urgent care and a steroid pack tamped things down. (The nurse said every patient coming in had the same!) Two weeks later, I’m still congested and coughing, but not wheezing when I walk uphill. W.T.F.

Fair warning: start taking some allergy meds before visiting and keep an eye on pollen levels with an app like Allergy Plus.

Books, books boooooks

I’m reading a ton since hitting the road in December and loving it! Here are some of my recent favorites. Please send me yours, oh erudite Traipsing reader.

• My Friends by Fredrick Backman: a beautiful, inspiring, sad novel by the author of A Man Called Ove. Couldn’t put it down!

• Empire Falls by Richard Russo: a Pulitzer-winning novel about a dying mill town in Maine. LOL funny at times, heart-rending at others. Brilliant.

• The Piano Shop on the Left Bank by Thad Carhart: loved this memoir of an adult going back to piano while living with his family in Paris. The depictions of the city and the culture delightful and I gobbled up the piano nerdery too.

• Empire of Silence (The Sun Eater, #1) by Christopher Ruocchio: sci-fiiii! What world-building; can’t wait to read the next few.

• Everything is Tuberculosis by John Green: I had no idea why everyone was raving about this nonfiction book, so I’ll just say: trust me (and the 50,000 other 5-star reviews).

• Joyride: A Memoir by Susan Orlean: A stunner of a memoir by the author of The Orchid Thief. Anyone who likes to write (or read!) will love this book.

• The Art of Spending Money by Morgan Housel: the latest and greatest from my fav financial writer.

• How to Know a Person by David Brooks: I wrote a whole newsletter about this book I liked it so much. Oh, to learn the contents of this at a younger age…forget trigonometry, schools should teach this!

Traipsing Tidbits

• Why kids are quitting sports (and how to rethink our approach: bring back the joy!).

• Some surprising data about AI’s water use (and not what the headlines say).

• Japan’s weird, fully-committed Halloween costumes.

• Such a time saver having this portable washing machine while we travel!

Traipsing About is waving farewell to Arizona and heading north. But first, a quote for the road…

There’s an old saying that nothing’s worse than getting what you want but not what you need. That sums up so many people’s relationship with money and success. If you’re lucky enough to get what you want (money), you might still realize it’s not what you need (family, friends, health, being part of something bigger than yourself). And then you’re disappointed. What could be worse?

The Art of Spending Money by Morgan Housel

Onward,

Dakota

P.S. I loved this dude’s rant about what nine years of not watching the news (in 60 seconds).

Hey there, Traipser! Dakota here with Traipsing About, my no-AI-slop newsletter exploring living an intentional life while reclaiming creativity as an adult. I spice things up with experiences, pictures and drawings from traveling in our Airstream.

Thank you for being here. I appreciate your time and attention in this firehose onslaught of a world, and hope today’s newsletter helps ground you a bit.

In case you missed it: Last time I wrote about the ups and downs of two months on the road in our Airstream.

Sedona eye candy

I love Sedona, and not for the famous vortex energy. I didn’t even partake in a horse divination session or didgeridoo lesson during our stay.

Instead, we spent over two weeks hiking, biking, and soaking up the aura of the place (ruh roh, they got me).

Auras or not, I love that bike rides in Sedona take longer because I can’t stop pausing to take photos. That the colors surprise and wow me and that every sunset somehow feels fresh and too magical to be real.

There’s just so much awesomeness: the saturated colors, the quasi-alien landscape, the sunsets that would make an Impressionist painter go apeshit with excitement. (And confound this newbie watercolorist.)

Enough chit chat. More pics, Dak Attack!

How to know a person

I just finished David Brooks’ book How to Know a Person and the contents are sloshing around in my head. It’s a reminder that while I’ve invested many hours learning about communication, there’s always more to grok.

For me, the most powerful idea was the distinction between an “Illuminator” and a “Diminisher.” For me, seeking to be the former in conversation feels like a lighthouse in the fog and rain of conversation, a signal to follow.

Illuminators:

I’d sum up this approach as “most people have their answers inside them, but they need a guide so they can hear themselves figure it out.” They know what to look for and how to ask the right questions at the right time.

They’re:

1. Persistently curious.

2. Receptive listeners (versus waiting for their turn to talk).

3. The kind of person who will sit next to you during a hard time.

4. People who see someone’s strengths and mirror them back at the person.

5. “Lingerable companions,” someone you look forward to hanging out with after dinner or by the pool.

Diminishers:

Meanwhile, we’ve all met—and at times probably BEEN—a Diminisher, someone who:

1. Instantly sizes people up (closing off their curiosity).

2. Talks AT people not with them (Bore Bombs!).

3. Stacks stereotypes instead of seeing the nuance in everyone (he’s a gun owner?! He must be this kind of person).

4. One-ups like mad (you did this? I did it too, but via helicopter under a full moon!)

Yikes am I guilty of one-upping. Someone mentions a trip to Iceland or that they play the piano and I seek common ground (oh, me too!). Soon, we’re talking about me and my experiences. Sigh.

I’ve chilled that tendency over the years, but still have to restrain myself like a yapping little dog flapping at the end of a leash whenever there’s common ground.

Not where, but why

Illuminators also ask for stories about specific events or experiences, and then they go even further. They don’t only want to talk about what happened, they want to know how you experienced what happened. Cool that you went on a trip… how did it change you?

Related to that, a good conversation is not a group of people making a series of statements at each other like two people galloping around with jousting lances thrusting like maniacs in separate lanes. Uhhh, that’s a BAD conversation. A good conversation is an act of joint exploration (and certainly doesn’t involve lances).

What I notice about those conversations is that I walk away completely unsatisfied. Unseen, bored, wishing I’d just used that time to play the piano or read a book instead.

Of course, being an Illuminator runs the risk of fading like a wallflower and letting other people trample you in conversation. But most of us don’t struggle with talking too little. We know our own stories, and many of us tell them often (raises hand).

I’m working on it. Less yapping, more listening.

Traipsing Tidbits

Things I found interesting, useful, or just downright cool. Never an affiliate link to be found.

• My recent post about maintenance paled in comparison to the hilarious summary of repairs that our friends at Living in Beauty have fixed in their 10 years full-timing in their Airstream. Note to self: AC units can just blow off the roof?!

• I just reached the milestone of five years of drawing, which makes me appreciate this lady’s TWENTY years of the same.

• Loved Kevin Kelly’s thoughts on six selfish reasons to have kids (including that they’re entertaining and that you potentially have friends for life).

• My favorite financial newsletter these days is Social Cap: funny, insightful, grounding thoughts on investing that always teaches me something.

• Alastair Humphreys with another brilliant idea: buying an old film camera and photographing the same tree every week for a year.

Traipsing About is heading over the nearby mountain pass. But first, a quote for the road…

Is it possible, finally, for one human being to achieve perfect understanding of another? We can invest enormous time and energy in serious efforts to know another person, but in the end, how close are we able to come to that person’s essence? We convince ourselves that we know the other person well, but do we really know anything important about anyone?

The Wind-up Bird Chronicles by Haruki Murakami

May we be Illuminators and give it our best shot!

Onward,

Dakota

This newsletter: Airstream life, Faces from the Road.

Hey there, Traipser! Dakota here with Traipsing About, my no-AI-slop newsletter exploring living an intentional life while reclaiming creativity as an adult, all spiced with experiences from rolling around in our Airstream.

Thank you for being here. I appreciate your time and attention in this harried, headline-every-minute world. May today’s newsletter helps ground you in the sea of chaos.

In case you missed it: Last time I wrote about five years of trading drawings with my college roommate and dear friend. Since then, I decided to (finally) try watercolor pencils, which I’ve been really enjoying…even if I have no idea what I’m doing.

The contrast of travel

Somehow we’ve already been kicking around in the Airstream for two months. Our little silver house has frolicked behind our truck for almost 2,000 miles, from Bend to San Diego, then east into Arizona.

A friend asked me if the days have become routine. Have the exciting “wow, this is special!” corners been sanded off?

Uh, hellll no. Seemingly every day has a moment of awe. The magic moments are piling up! Here are a few:

• A rocket launch over Anza-Borrego during a full moon.

• Stargazing during a meteor shower in the Alabama Hills.

• A sunset coyote serenade (←video) in Saguaro National Park.

Of course, like folding into a pint-sized airplane seat for a long flight to see Italy’s Duomo, there are tradeoffs. Towing on potholed roads makes me so tense I get headaches. Moving solar panels around or dumping gray water bucket by bucket when dry camping is time consuming. So is doing laundry in a portable washing machine, then hanging everything outside.

Cue the world’s smallest violin. I’m not complaining! Really!! (<--Two exclamation points.)

Indeed, we chose this lifestyle with eyes open. Luckily, the balance tilts strongly in favor of the positive experiences. While it’s nothing special—any fool can hitch up a trailer and tow it around—it’s enabling what we want right now.

Finding a balance

But we’re keeping this in mind: how much contrast is worth it? How can we find a pace and style of travel that keeps things interesting, but doesn’t feel like endless transitions and require copious travel planning? If memories primarily consist of hitching and unhitching the trailer, moving solar panels, and highway driving, we’re doing it wrong.

Oh, but the benefits. The elation of pedaling or stomping off into a new landscape; witnessing a desert bloom fill an entire valley; a bobcat staring at us for minutes, or the swooping, hooting great horned owls at Catalina State Park.

Above all, the feeling of being a small speck in the universe, whether in the Pacific Ocean or all alone at the top of a remote canyon in Organ Pipe National Monument.

Even when we’re not out exploring, we love how the Airstream’s big windows immerse us in nature. (Two quail are dust bathing outside right now.) We watch birds, bunnies, and also all the incredibly fit seniors crushing workouts in campgrounds.

Meanwhile, warm weather allows meals outside—or playing piano with a vista. Snowbirding is working for us.

After a year of taking it a bit easier due to my myocarditis surprise in 2024, feeling fitness coursing through my body is intoxicating. During a recent mountain bike ride, the steep rocky trail turned into a creek-filled canyon. I rock-hopped and bushwhacked for an hour, sometimes carrying my bike over my head through cacti. Stupid as the outing was, I felt totally elated to be fit enough to enjoy it.

As much as I enjoy conversations with other campers, we definitely miss our community back home. That deep comfort of time with people we know well is irreplaceable. A big tradeoff with being on the road.

The silver lining is the opportunity to see far-flung friends and family, plus hang out with Traipsing readers who aren’t friends yet.

On a recent evening, I attended a stellar piano performance at the University of Arizona by Grammy winner Víkingur Ólafsson with George, a long-time reader. After the show, I stayed up late talking with him and his two adventurous friends, a travel nurse and the Mosquito Lady, who does natural bug eradication and lived in Bali for 14 years. A serendipitous experience, and one of my favorite parts of travel.

The morning after, I was on my stomach repairing the trailer’s sewer outlet pipe with ABS cement, then wrestling with a drawer that loves to pop open during travel. Afterward, I hauled a couple buckets full of gray water across the campground.

Worth it? Absolutely.

Variety, the spice

Strangely, these contrasts serve to make each situation fresh and new. Nothing is forever with Airstream travel: five days of conserving power and water while boondocking flow into the luxury of full hookups. Long(er) showers, for one—though we only have six gallons of hot water. The occasional barking dog next door is a minor irritation because that canine is soon moving down the road to somewhere we aren’t.

When we bought the trailer, in zero ways did I expect to say the following: RV parks aren’t too bad. We’ve only stayed at a few on this trip, but they’re quiet, convenient and perfect for refueling the trailer after dry camping. Like a tired long-distance hiker rolling into town to scrub dirt off their face and eat all the food, RV parks are a place to cook/store up a reserve in the freezer and get dialed.

Our goal with the Airstream was to stay places longer than we did during van life. More days in one place is life-supporting versus careening from place to place. We aren’t sure what the right pace is, but I suspect it’s about two weeks in each place. We’ll see fewer mountain ranges, but feel the ones we spend time in more.

As English philosopher John Ruskin penned,

“All traveling becomes dull in exact proportion to its rapidity. A fool wants to shorten space and time; a wise man attempts to lengthen both.”

Also, the longer stays allow for routines and rituals. I want to write consistently and keep my piano practice going, but both those fall away when we’re rolling too often. Plus regular physical therapy and strength training! Now that we’re over 40, no consistent PT = bodies collapsing like saggy birthday balloons.

So, after two months, I can safely say this is what we want to be doing! Every time we hitch the trailer up and pull onto the open road, the feeling of “this is awesome“ courses through my veins. I watch our little silver house behind us and feel excited to pull into our next location, to soak up the next moment of awe.

Then the road reminds me that I’m towing 7,000 pounds and I get back to avoiding potholes.

Faces from the Road

As Carolyn Muegge-Vaughn told ever-more incredible stories, our dinner table kept glancing at each other, “who is this woman?!” stenciled on our faces.

Competing in the Iditarod dog sled race...the summer after she first saw a dog sled. An expedition to Antarctica with her 89 year old husband… to climb a mountain named after him. (Here’s the YouTube documentary.)

Now, she’s currently solo traveling around North America in her DIY camper van between stints overseas with Doctors Without Borders (DWB).

Oh...did I mention she’s 83?!

After her husband died over a decade ago, she assessed her life and decided to enroll with DWB, which she’s continued ever since with stints in Sierra Leone, Bangladesh, and Myanmar, among others. She’s managed 77 Land Cruisers in Malawi for a measles campaign where there were no roads and run an entire operation in Sudan when things went, shall we say, awry, with the government.

Dear Carolyn, thank you for showing me that we can reinvent and challenge ourselves many times in the span of a life. You’re an inspiration. Happy trails!

This Traipsing About newsletter is motoring onward. But first, a quote for the road that I aspire to live up to:

At its best, travel is embraced not as a flashy backdrop for our lifestyle ambitions, but as an act that touches every aspect of our being. Travel is not a swaggering declaration of self, undertaken to impress other people; it is a quiet inquiry, requiring awareness, resilience, and openness to change.

Rolf Potts, The Vagabond’s Way

Onward,

Dakota

This newsletter: desert life, drawing as ritual, and thin vs. thick desires.

Whaaaat’s up, Traipser! Dakota here with Traipsing About, my no-AI-slop newsletter exploring living an intentional life while reclaiming creativity as an adult, all spiced with experiences from overland travel.

Our roadtrip continues! At the moment, we’re kicking around the Arizona desert while totally loving the cacti-infused views, awesome hikes/rides and mid-70s daily temps. After decades of snowy winters, this is a reminder to listen to our elders—snow birding kicks ass.

In case you missed it: Last time I wrote about getting my surf on in San Diego (aka flailing) while we’re out for round two of Traipsing About.

A stack of sketchpads

Five years ago, Beethoven accidentally started a daily ritual between me and my college roommate. Not the symphonies; a surly doodle of the composer plus a spontaneous text kicked it off.

At the time, I was journaling daily. I’d scribble the day’s snippets, Italian words I’d learned, maybe a musical concept I was toying with.

On a whim one evening, I sketched Beethoven and texted a pic to Eric, co-conspirator in many a fine adventure. He texted back a doodle of his own.

The next day, I sent another. So did he.

A ritual was born.

Just keep drawing

A half decade later, through work, travel, sickness, and assorted life complications, we’ve pinged one another with the day’s drawing. Sometimes they’re journal-y, a thing we did that day. Or sometimes they’re goofy, a play on words from a song or something we read.

We revisit old jokes, concoct new ones to crack each other up. We also share moments of joy and pain in our lives. Often we acknowledge receipt simply with a thumbs up, haha or heart; sometimes, it kicks off a quick text exchange or spurs a phone call.

Always, they’re a lens into a life of someone that I love dearly, a guy I don’t see nearly often enough thanks to living in different cities.

We don’t draw every day—sick kids for Eric or a trip for one of us might derail things. Eric has sent many drawings after midnight, whereas my willpower is exhausted around 11 p.m. (Similar to when we worked late on college projects.) Still, most days of the month, we’re sketching a memory from the day and sharing it with one another.

We only miss a handful of drawings each year; a pile of full notebooks is the proof.

It’s often the first way we share major personal news with each other. Eric has kids, a rocking social calendar, and a busy career, so a phone call is tough to fit in. Still, I feel more connected to him now than I have since leaving Portland years ago.

Learning to draw

Eric is an engineer by trade, and also long-time artist. I get his texts and just marvel at his drawing chops.

I, on the other hand, couldn’t draw a poodle’s mullet when I started, and still struggle with the poodle. I was at the stick-figure level where most people freeze, around 10 years old. (It’s when our inner critic shows up, ugh.)

Vanishing points and two-point perspective, what dat? Proper dimensions for portraits and locations of ears? Alchemy.

Slowly but surely, through trial and error, I’ve imbibed enough to competently come up with a concept—half the fun for me—and then put pencil or pen to paper.

Are they good, pristine, went-to-art-school drawings? *Belly laugh*

And that’s the point. I don’t want to invest tons of time and effort into this. I’m too intense about activities already, so this is an opportunity to grasp it loosely. (Says the guy doing them daily...)

In fact, usually I aim to do them in less than 10 minutes, to not be perfect, to never crumple up failures. One take, snap text PING. Done. I’ve even switched to pen instead of pencil so that I commit to lines and can’t erase.

Ok, fine, not always ten minute drawings. One month, I only drew portraits of musicians, studying portraiture and spending a solid chunk of time on each. It’s a testament to our friendship that Eric didn’t block my number after yet another wigged composer portrait.

I’ve drawn in our house, overlooking mountain ranges in our former Sprinter van and saguaros in the Airstream, and on a floating dock in the middle of an alpine lake during a bikepacking trip. I’ve dragged myself to the notebook when I had covid, when I was so tired my eyes hurt, and when we had guests in town.

However, Eric and I also give ourselves a complete pass to skip a day, zero worries. This isn’t a streak, a calendar of X’s or an ego play of “I draw EVERY day.” Nothing would sap the fun quicker than making it a have to versus a want to.

In fact, the exercise isn’t about the drawing. Without Eric, I would have for suuuure stopped years ago. It’s about the connection with my dear friend.

In my calendar, I’ve got a yearly anniversary reminder about drawing. Each year, I ping Eric to make sure this is a joy to continue, not a burden to bear.

He just reupped for another year, so off we go. Here’s to making it to a decade of daily drawings, my friend.

Thick vs. thin desires

The essay Thin Desires Are Eating Your Life put in words what I’ve been pursuing since leaving social media seven years ago. (Because it was eating my life!)

In short:

A thick desire is one that changes you in the process of pursuing it.

A thin desire is one that doesn’t.

The entire essay spoke to me, including this excerpt:

Thick desires are inconvenient. They take years to cultivate and can’t be satisfied on demand.

The desire to master a craft, to read slowly, to be embedded in a genuine community, to understand your place in some tradition larger than yourself: these desires are effortful to acquire and impossible to fully gratify.

They embed you in webs of obligation and reciprocity. They make you dependent on specific people and places. From the perspective of a frictionless global marketplace, all of this is pure inefficiency.

But I’ve started to suspect that the thick life might be worth pursuing anyway, on its own terms, without needing to become a movement.

How can you take one tiny step today to unchain yourself from a thin desire?

This Traipsing About newsletter is heading over the hill to the next campground.

But first, a quote about friendships from David Whyte’s Consolations:

Friendship is a mirror to presence and a testament to forgiveness. Friendship not only helps us see ourselves through another's eyes, but can be sustained over the years only with someone who has repeatedly forgiven us for our trespasses as we must find it in ourselves to forgive them in turn.

A friend knows our difficulties and shadows and remains in sight, a companion to our vulnerabilities more than our triumphs, when we are under the strange illusion we do not need them. An undercurrent of real friendship is a blessing exactly because its elemental form is rediscovered again and again through understanding and mercy.

All friendships of any length are based on a continued, mutual forgiveness. Without tolerance and mercy, all friendships die.

Onward,

Dakota

This newsletter: surf noobie, giving things up, and beach textures.

Happy New Year, Traipser! Dakota here with Traipsing About, my newsletter exploring living an intentional life while retrying creativity (as an adult!), all spiced with experiences from overland travel.

No bots around here, just my goofy daily drawings, photos from travels, and thoughts on topics that interest me.

Wow, heavy events, both international and domestic, this week. I hope you’re all hanging in there. We’re taking it all in from the desert after a rainy San Diego holiday with family. Big ocotillo plants, blooming desert flowers, corrugated mountains, and nowhere to be is the order of the week for us.

In case you missed it: Last time I wrote about hitting the road in our Airstream for round two of Traipsing About. Where will our wheels take us?

Also, a housekeeping note: If you haven’t seen my emails lately, they’ve likely been gobbled up by greedy Spam Goblins (aka your spam folder).

Things you can do to stick it to the Goblins:

• Add traipsingabout@substack.com to your contacts.

• If you spot my newsletter in spam or promotions, mark it as “Not Spam” or drag it to your Primary inbox

• Replying with a quick “hello” or emoji works wonders! Always great to hear from you.

Surfing is easy (until you try it)

While we were in San Diego, I gave surfing an honest go. With a borrowed board and wetsuit from my brother-in-law, off I went.

In past years, my surfing forays involved friends handing me a board and disappearing beyond the pounding waves. “Just paddle out!” they’d shout over their shoulder.

Easy in theory, right? Just paddle when a wave shows up, then stand up on your board and ride that sucker to shore!

Instead, I’d fight waves, get tumbled in the surf (yay, free salty cerebral cavity rinse), and then drag myself up to lie on the beach like a discarded car tire.

Try again. Awkwardly pop up to stand on the tippy, slippy board. Ass over teakettle. Are we having fun yet?

Drag myself to beach. Lie flat on board, questioning physical abilities. Remember how natural mountain biking felt the first few times…and how this reaaaally doesn’t.

But THIS time around, I actually made progress. (Hell, just surviving surfing is progress if you ask me.)

Why? I took a different approach and applied deliberate practice to my efforts. I broke things down into pieces rather than doing everything at once.

In piano, this would translate to playing the same note over and over to get the feel of the key movement instead of learning a song. In language, it would be breaking a word down into components rather than saying a sentence.

It’s what kids who non-stop dribble a basketball do: one. simple. thing.

So I practiced my pop-up on the beach, recreating moves my friend Wes styled for me at a Reno trailhead.

Then I stood in waist-deep water and waited for waves to crash before simply diving onto my board and letting the whitewash carry me toward shore. A couple rides on my knees, feeling the balance points.

After a bit, I was popping up to stand and riding the whitewash in (almost always with an awkward fall at the end).

By the fourth day of doing this, a) my body felt like I’d been smashed by a whale and b) I was catching real (small) waves, straight out of the green part of the wave. Every time was a rush; I saw a glimmer of why many friends of mine love it.

We’ll see where the surf energy takes me. I can picture myself plopped on a Central American beach or camped on the coast just throwing myself at it until I get good don’t look like Humpty Dumpty falling off a wall.

For now, I’m going to bike and hike my face off under the desert sun. No salty nasal rinses there!

But surfing this time around reminded me of something I keep encountering in my music, language, and creativity efforts: progress isn’t dramatic. It’s awkward, quiet, repetitive. “Ant’s work,” as my piano teacher says.

And then, suddenly, it’s intoxicating.

An idea to kick off the new year

No New Year’s resolutions for me to start 2026. Instead, this concept from Mark Manson resonates with me:

Instead of thinking about what you’d like to add to your life, ask yourself what you’re willing to give up or remove from your life.

Because in 2026, most of our problem is not that we lack access or opportunity to something. The problem is that we have access and opportunity for too much. We are scattered, distracted, overwhelmed, pulled in eight different directions, and as a result, we live our lives in constant motion and stimulation but still feeling like we got nothing done.

Beach textures

Over the holidays, we camped on the beach at San Elijo State Park in Encinitas. While the roar of sport bikes on Highway 101 wasn’t my fav and the trains were noisy, the proximity to the beach made it worth it and the noise disappeared as soon as we walked down the stairs to the ocean.

As usual, I loved the subtleties and textures when I got up close to features. Here are some favs.

Traipsing Tidbits

1. Campflare has transformed our travel, letting us to set up free notifications for campgrounds and snag last-minute cancellations for popular parks. You can get it as an app or use on your desktop.

2. Wait But Why’s “Tales from Toddlerhood” cracked me up (and friends with kids that I sent it to).

3. A recent study shows that hard exercise after a vaccine increases your risk of getting myocarditis (aka f’ing up your heart!). Well, that’s exactly what I did in fall 2024 when a vaccine landed me in the ER. (I’m 100% good now, luckily.) Take it from me and do yoga, not wind sprints or a hard bike ride, for a few days off after a shot.

This Traipsing About newsletter is checking out of the campsite.

But first, a thought for the road from writer and designer Edith Wharton (the first woman to win the Pulitzer Prize) on what causes old age:

“The producer of old age is habit: the deathly process of doing the same thing in the same way at the same hour day after day, first from carelessness, then from inclination, at last from cowardice or inertia.

Habit is necessary; but it is the habit of having careless habits, of turning a trail into a rut, that must be incessantly fought against if one is to remain alive ... one can remain alive long past the usual date of disintegration if one is unafraid of change, insatiable in intellectual curiosity, interested in big things, and happy in small ways.”

Onward,

Dakota

P.S. I laughed so hard “how small a mailbox would your mailman deliver to?”

This newsletter: shifting gears into a new life phase.

What up, Traipser! Dakota here with Traipsing About, my ongoing experiment in living creatively, traveling intentionally, and reflecting on what makes life feel meaningful.

In case you missed it: Last time I wrote about spending money on things you’ll actually use, not what others will see.

Traipsing About, round two

We’re on the road again! On December 1, we rented our house out and headed out for some traipsing.

For the past week, Chelsea and I have woken up in the silver embrace of our Airstream. I’m typing this from the Alabama Hills, land of giant boulders scattered at the foot of the snow-capped Sierras in California.

Beyond a family Christmas in San Diego, we don’t have any plans nailed down. But with bikes and hiking shoes in the truck and a digital piano tucked into the Airstream, we’ve got everything we need for a comfortable ramble.

I keep coming back to a line from Robert Louis Stevenson:

“I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel’s sake. The great affair is to move.”

A different kind of trip

This round is different for a number of reasons.

Neither of us are working, for one. Not checking email first thing (no “problem du jour”) is a joy I don’t take for granted.

Also, we have running water and a toilet. Yep—the lap of luxury. Compared to the van, the Airstream feels like a tiny house: light pouring through big windows, a kitchen that actually invites us to cook, and just enough space to breathe. Vacuuming its 180 square feet only takes 3 minutes!

Oh, and we’re a decade older than during our 2013–2016 van trip, with new hobbies and a different sense of the world. How that plays out day to day remains to be seen, but we have a few ideas.

We’re aiming to travel slower: fewer places, longer stays. We loved our Sprinter van, but it was basic during our big trip—no running water, no toilet—and far smaller. We were always perched rather than planted, inertia carrying us forward: go, go, go.

Now we set up the trailer and leave it put. The truck is our 4x4 runaround rig, which means we can head out for a hike or a bike ride without packing up our entire house first. I can go crash around on my mountain bike while Chelsea lounges in comfort.

Why Not Just Stay Home?

Yes, there were (and are) reasons not to do this. The liftoff energy was real: prepping the house for rent, dismantling Chelsea’s astonishing plant collection, and trusting our space to strangers. We’re still wrung out like limp dish towels from getting out the door.

And yes, we could happily stay in Bend. It’s a fantastic place to live, and we love our friends and neighbors. But we’re both feeling the need for a reset, and this is the best way we know how.

So this is a midlife break—a quest for fewer life complications. (Says the guy who took apart the Airstream furnace two days ago to diagnose an issue.)

More time outside in beautiful places. Connection with people we care about. We want a pace that leaves room for passions (like piano for me), for taking care of our bodies with boring mid-life shit like physical therapy, and for prepping meals that aren’t just microwaved Trader Joe’s sushi.

Do It Now

As I’ve told Chelsea, I’d regret not seizing this opportunity. Between COVID, health stuff for both of us, and care for our now-departed sweet kitty Oliver, we are ready to cast off for a while. (More to come about Oliver.)

Our parents are healthy. We don’t have kids or jobs or anywhere we have to be…oh mah gerd does it feel delightful.

Chelsea encouraged me to dream about the future, so like a good nerd, I made a spreadsheet. It’s full of places and ideas, but the gist is simple: connecting with people we love in beautiful places.

Lewis Carroll’s quip also comes to mind: if you’re never exactly sure where you’re going, any road will take you there.

Through all the effort of getting out the door and the excitement of being on the road, I’ve also had the words of my dear mentor Duncan pinging in my brain. On his 70th birthday, when I told him about our plans, he told me:

Let it wash over you. Don’t rush to settle. The chance to be freewheeling in your 40s, while you’re healthy, is a gift. Treasure it.

And that’s exactly what we’re doing. This time feels rare, and we’re not taking it for granted.

Full speed ahead…slowly.

Desert textures

I’m a mountains and trees kinda guy and have spent most of my life living in and exploring those areas. However, there’s nothing like some winter desert sun.

One thing I especially love are the textures when you get up close to the gnarly, survivalist plants and scarred rocks out here. Here are some favs!

Faces from the road returns

Now that we’re rolling again, I’m bringing back a series I did years ago called Faces From the Road. This will be a snapshot of inspiring/cool/fantastic humans that we encounter while we’re out and about.

Kicking it off with Joe, a teacher from Ashland, OR who DIY’d this 1990s Nissan firetruck that he imported from Japan. The shell is made from fiberglass and reused fence boards. It “sleeps two if you like each other.” Basic, functional, awesome!

Beyond that, I dug his low-key attitude and obvious focus on life adventures. He’s been a river guide, bike toured New Zealand, and built out the truck for his latest passion, ski touring.

Cheers, Joe!

This Traipsing About newsletter is rolling outta the parking lot.

But first, a framing of travel that I love:

At its best, travel is embraced not as a flashy backdrop for our lifestyle ambitions, but as an act that touches every aspect of our being. Travel is not a swaggering declaration of self, undertaken to impress other people; it is a quiet inquiry, requiring awareness, resilience, and openness to change.

Rolf Potts, The Vagabond’s Way

That’s it, folks! Onward,

Dakota

This week: how to stop chasing shiny things and start investing in the stuff and activities that actually light you up.

What up, Traipser! Dakota here with Traipsing About, my ongoing experiment in living creatively, traveling intentionally, and reflecting on what makes life feel meaningful.

Chelsea and I just got back from a little fall road trip through Oregon and Idaho. Good times showing her some of my favorite areas, plus a family visit.

This week’s Traipsing About (undelayed) flight is touching down on time with:

• Spending money on what you’ll actually use.

• Advice for a young reader.

• Buying back your time while traveling.

In case you missed it: my last four newsletters explored friction and how it benefits us by building character, strengthening friendships, creating story, and helping us slow down. For easy reading, here are all four posts combined into one.

Forget the facade

In Morgan Housel’s excellent new book, The Art of Spending Money, he shares a principle I love: spend money on things you’ll actually use and enjoy, not on what others will see.

Instead of buying a low-end BMW for the logo and shiny rims, buy a high-end Toyota. You’ll enjoy the heated steering wheel, deluxe sound system, and safety features every time you drive...even if nobody else notices.

Same idea with your home. Skip the fancy facade and spend on what improves your daily life. Upgrade your lighting and sound system. Get that induction stove. Create a workout space. For SURE invest in great mattresses to get the best sleep you can.

In short: spend where it juices your life, not your image.

Housel sticks to money, but I think this idea goes way beyond spending.

Take careers. I remember feeling weird about shifting from “sustainability engineering” to finance. It sounded… less impressive. Yet that pivot let me build a great business, support seven employees, and live a life that supported my travel dreams and actually fit me. That choice came from focusing on what I wanted—flexibility and independence—not what sounded admirable to others.

Same goes for hobbies. Do you run marathons, collect wine, or volunteer because they light you up, or because they make for a good story, something to post online? The activity doesn’t change, but the why behind it does. The joy I get from playing piano has nothing to do with performing for others; if it were about applause, I suspect I’d have quit years ago.

And then there’s travel. Under the baleful glare of social media, it’s easy to chase trips that look impressive instead of meaningful. Waterfalls in Iceland. Pistachio chocolate in Dubai. Surf trips in Indonesia. Oooooh la la.

And hey, if those things genuinely excite you, go for it! (Iceland really is stunning...) But ask yourself: are you going because it calls to you, or because it photographs well? (Bonus points if you use AI to scrub out the other Grammers and YouTubers from your shot.)

People don’t admire you in the fancy car, they admire the car. They don’t think you’re sophisticated for sipping wine in Italy, but they do imagine themselves there. So don’t trade your real wants for someone else’s idea of “cool.” #notworthit

Life is too short not to live your own personal cool. As Morgan Housel says,

“The reason few material things would make their way into your ideal obituary is because you inherently know those things don’t actually matter.”

So focus on the things that really do: the stuff inside, not out.

Advice for a young reader

Ted Gioia’s attuned response to a young person’s request for how to navigate this complex world feels spot on to me! I’m bolding them obnoxiously because they’re awesome. (He expands on them in the full essay.)

1. Cultivate time away from screens.

2. Connect with people in the flesh—it’s easier than you think.

3. Cultivate the new skills that will be rewarded in the future.

4. Seek out connections with places, nurturing your love of the natural world.

5. You can still use the Internet—but do it purposefully, not as someone else’s pawn.

6. Encourage others to join you on this journey.

Buying back your time while traveling

This travel writer from Japan shared travel advice that I love!

Time is limited, especially when you’re traveling. There are always more things to do than time to do them in. Decisions, decisions.

In service to my desire to do not very much in a lovely locale, I strongly dislike expending time doing tedious but necessary things like getting from place A to place B. So, I am in favor of ways to buy back some of my time.

Ways to buy back your time (some actually don’t cost any money):

• Fly non-stop.

• Use points to book business-class so you can get some sleep.

• Take a sleeper train or bus between cities or countries.

• Take a taxi. Yes it feels cool, and insider, to learn to navigate the trains. And it’s fun to ride them. Not when they’re packed to the gills and you can smell everyone’s sweat and everything. That’s definitely not fun. In many situations grabbing a taxi can save you significant time and inconvenience for only a bit more money.

• Don’t wait in a 2 hour line for some ramen that is only marginally better (if that) than another ramen joint a half a block away (this one doesn’t even cost any money).

• Do things close to where you’re staying. No matter where that is. Do local things. Extremely local things. Explore whichever neighborhood you ended up choosing to stay in even if it’s not considered the most popular or doesn’t have a zillion Instagram reels about it.

Traipsing Tidbits

• Check out Steven Casmiro’s newsletter, which is about “living a good life in exceptionally strange times.”

• This New York Times interview with Rick Steves gave me a newfound respect for him. (Bonus: we listened to his new audiobook, On the Hippie Trail, during our recent road trip.)

• If you don’t want all your info on Google, you can easily request to remove it!

• This JAMA study showed a 70% relative reduction in confirmed COVID infections (and fewer colds) among those using azelastine nasal spray (Astepro is the brand I bought!) compared with placebo.

This Traipsing About newsletter is getting on a direct flight outta here.

But first, a thought-provoking idea from James Clear:

If you want a plant to grow, you can fuss over it every day—watering, weeding, moving it toward the sun. Or you can place it in the right soil and let nature do most of the work. A seed planted in the right spot often thrives on its own. Life is much the same. Progress is not only about how hard you work, but also about where you decide to work.

Where is your energy better spent right now: pushing harder or planting yourself in better ground?

That’s it, folks! Onward,

Dakota

I initially wrote this as a four-part series about how friction improves our lives. Here’s all four in one essay!

In praise of friction

I want more friction in my life—not less.

Wait, whaaat? You want the WALL-E life?! Just hand me a sippy cup and a beach chair, brosef.

Um, no thanks. Plus I know you, wise Traipsing reader, wouldn’t ever say that either.

Because here’s the thing: friction gets a bad rap—but it’s often where meaning, growth, and connection happen. In a world obsessed with smooth, seamless efficiency, I’m here to argue for the value of (some) things being just a little harder.

As the wise Anthony De Mello writes,

"Happy events make life delightful but they do not lead to self-discovery and growth and freedom. That privilege is reserved to the things and persons and situations that cause us pain."

By the way, I’m not talking about the shitty friction like Bluetooth in the car inexplicably not syncing or going back to hand laundering my clothes. No way, I love modern conveniences—I’m keeping my iPhone!

Nope, I’m talking about friction as the obstacle enroute to a goal, the delayed gratification, the forced pause to make a considered move.

For me, friction creates a life filled with intention. More deliberate choices, not just being shepherded around by a digital overlord. More time with people and a stronger sense of community. More adventures and better stories. Steering the ship like a badass pirate, not stuck below deck wondering where it’s headed.

Friction builds character

The struggle and the time—ahem, friction—spent learning or doing anything makes it meaningful. It’s where we develop perseverance, confidence, and resilience. It’s how we avoid blowing away like a beach ball in the wind anytime things get hard.

Think about it: what skill or experience you’re proud of came easily?

Do people who inherit money brag about it? Nope. Anyone who boasts about the gleaming Mercedes their daddy gave them is basically broadcasting, I’ve never done anything hard in my life. (Cya, sucka!)

Same goes for compliments. “Wow, I love your landscaping” hits differently than “You have lovely eyes.” Why? Because one took effort; the other was received. (Thanks, Mom and Dad—I love my eyeball Mercedes!)

For me, if music skills or languages were simply downloaded into my brain and fingers, the satisfaction levels would be zilch, nulla, nada. I've earned the ability to create music from 88 black and white keys or speak Italian through difficult, delicious effort. The process and journey is a huge chunk of the reason it matters.

Compare that to AI, which can crank out a song, painting, or piece of writing in the time it took me to write this sentence.

Our superpower as humans is that we actually get experience the world—in all its glorious friction. To be surprised by things, to feel joy, to dive deep into a new skill without needing to know why.

In fact, the great Russian novelist Tolstoy wrote about this necessary striving in Anna Karenina and War and Peace, where characters find fulfillment not in luxury or power, but in humble effort, relationships, and moral development. Science fiction writer Isaac Asimov has similar themes in his amazing Foundation series—he believed that human progress—through science, reason, and curiosity—is inherently meaningful.

I’d argue this is why people don’t give a ferret’s fart about AI music or books. No friction, no effort or sweat behind it. Just content (ugh). No wonder people recently raged at Spotify for promoting AI band The Velvet Sundown, which fronted as flesh and blood musicians.

In short, friction is the burning feeling in our brains when we're making connections, creating, building something of value. It’s a core part of being human.

And to that, I yell from the Traipsing About rooftop: Gimme more!

Strengthening friendships with friction

My first year in Bend, I learned how a broken toe can build a friendship.

I’d taken a new friend on a group run on tricky terrain. At one point, he dropped back while I was up around the bend with another runner. I waited a bit...no sign of him.

Huh, weird. Oh well, let’s climb up to the waterfall ahead!

On my way back down the trail, I came upon my friend, now limping along. He’d fallen and broken his toe while I was cavorting ahead. Cue awkward moment.

Kudos to him, he leaned in and told me how he felt. Stammering my way through that conversation with him cemented our friendship in a way that wouldn’t have happened otherwise. (His openness to me sounding like a penitent idiot helped.)

Contrast stammering with perfectly sculpting all communication, whether belaboring a text response or simply asking ChatGPT what to say. A perfect response that feels like winning in the moment actually robs us of one of the prime opportunities in communication. You guessed it: FRICTION.

Consider being in conflict with your partner or friend. They send a perfectly worded text or email to you explaining things and taking responsibility.

My god, have they done years of therapy and meditate every morning? Does it say “Aspiring Dalai Lama” on their LinkedIn profile?

Nope: they admit that ChatGPT wrote the entire thing.

Cue the air rushing out of a balloon as the conversation crashes: FWEEEEEEET.

Do you feel closer to them? Do you trust them more?

Hell. No. Not in a million therapy sessions.

That’s because emotional friction (conflicts, misunderstandings, compromise!) creates a feeling of closeness.

In the same way that surmounting a tough work project or hard physical experience brings us closer together, navigating hard conversations strengthens trust. The messy conversations shows us what people are made of, that they care enough to try.

Messiness (ahem, friction) can also be a fantastic signaling tool for knowing when enough is enough. For instance, one friendship blew up after a joke of mine went awry. I apologized profusely, but my friend refused any attempt at repair. In fact, the trip ended with him driving off in a huff, throwing a gift I’d gotten him out the window on the way out.

Reflecting later, I realized I didn’t want to try additional repair. I’d ignored other red flags in the past (oops), but this flag had flapped in the first hard breeze and snapped me in the face. Buh byyyye.

On the flip side, with close friends, I’ll step up and admit to being a jackass. That’s not just an apology, it’s proof I value the relationship enough to limp through the awkward moments. Because when the dust settles, friction isn’t what breaks us apart. It’s the broken toes, bad jokes, and messy conversations that prove we’re worth holding together.

Friction is the story

Most holidays blur together for me, but not the one where a fully-laden Christmas tree toppled onto my flailing grandma as my raucous Italian family laughed uncontrollably. At least one of my aunts peed her pants.

In fact, my best stories are rarely (never?) about things going smoothly. They’re about friction, be it a family holiday or a far-flung trip.

I’m talking about things like a Hawaiian wave soaking me and Chelsea during our wedding photos. Or a small child throwing up all over Chelsea and our traveling companions on an overnight train in China. Or perhaps bike trips laced with lightning storms, broken derailleurs and bike frames, or weirdos in a Walmart parking lot scaring the bejeebus out of us as we “stealth camped” in our van overnight.

Yes, please, serve me some friction with a side of unknown! For dessert, I’d like some randomness.

After all, in storytelling, conflict = plot. In life, friction = memory. Perfect beach vacations are lovely, sure, but they’re yawn-tastic in a story. “We went to the beach. It was sunny. We drank cocktails. The end.”

A family dinner where everything goes right is pleasant. The one where I accidentally spilled an entire pitcher of grape juice and my grandpa’s blood pressure pinged off the moon is engraved forever in my memory. (My poor grandparents!)

As Kevin Kelly puts it in his excellent “50 Years of Travel Tips,” travel comes in two flavors: retreat (recharging with margaritas on the beach) or engage (leaning into uncertainty and surprise). Craig Mod describes it as stepping into the unknown.

I just call it friction. The kind of travel that leaves you changed, with stories worth telling. Like my brother and me spending six days on the Trans-Siberian Railroad, building a makeshift sail to push air into our sweltering cabin (Paul Theroux would have been proud). Well, until furious Russian train attendants tore it down. Annoying in the moment (gawd it was hot in Siberia), unforgettable in hindsight.

When people travel, they often try to erase friction, researching every corner of a destination until no surprises remain. The Airbnb, landmarks, restaurants, and the coffee or croissant spot are already mapped. (What about the toilets; better check those in advance!)

But what if you left a little to chance? Showed up without an agenda, without Instagram’s highlight reel guiding your every move? Whatever magic a destination holds gets hammered out by too many tourists anyway; a selfie stick to the eye wrecks any experience.

Sure, some friction is just hassle. In 2006, me traveling without a phone or laptop meant hunting for internet cafés just to book a ticket, or fending off shouting hotel touts after stepping off a bus or boat. Not fun, not a good story.

There’s a place for it though. Lisa Abend takes a delightful modern twist on this. “Each month, I go to a place in Europe I’ve never been before, travel around entirely offline, and bring back stories of my adventures.”

Even with cell phones, other friction opens doors. On a three-month bike trip through Europe, we left our route unplanned and commented on a vegan food blog in Belgium. That led to three unexpected days staying with the blogger near Bruges, plus connections with friends in Ghent. Scheduled and booked, it never would have happened.

This has been true on every journey I’ve taken: Every time I leave things open, serendipity shows up. Over and over, friction isn’t inconvenience, it’s the spark for stories and relationships.

That isn’t just true on the road. Life itself works the same way. The moments we remember aren’t when everything went smoothly, but when things went fabulously sideways. Grape juice spills and power outages shake things up!

Perfect trips and seamless dinners fade. At the end of our days, what we’ll remember are the stories, our time with people, whether close family and friends or a stranger eager to share a piece of their life.

Friction becomes story. So if a Christmas tree happens to topple onto grandma this year… well, you might just be gifting your family the best holiday memory yet.

Give the tree a little bump with your hip.

The power of friction

In this series, I’ve tackled the concept of friction. Since then, I keep noticing it everywhere. (Call me a dude with a hammer looking for friction, whatevs!)

Scott Galloway warns that AI companions create “connections forged without friction, where intimacy is artificial.” Cognitive science researcher Eva Keiffenheim urges us to “put the friction back in” so we don’t offload too much thinking to machines. And Cal Newport reminds us that a bit of resistance can tame our questing simian minds’ dependence on them. Limit timers for apps? Pffft, monkeys can figure that out! Gotta put the phone in a drawer.

Even finance, that temple of efficiency, benefits from friction. The IEX stock exchange slowed down trading signals, as Michael Lewis chronicled in the excellent book Flash Boys.

Friction at a personal level

No friction in our lives runs the risk of transforming us into dreadful, entitled caricatures, someone like Harry Potter’s revolting cousin Dudley. Without effort and pushback (aka people telling us when we screw up), how can we possibly develop the grit and tenacity to thrive while avoiding becoming a stinky turd of a human?

As Scott Galloway puts it in his essay Love Algorithmically,

“We need people to judge us, to point out when we say something stupid. Friction and conflict are key to developing resilience and learning how to function in society.”

Friction shows up in the burn of a workout, in researching sustainable products vs. single-use crap. It’s the effort it takes to learn a skill, digging in for dozens or hundreds of hours. (Wow have I felt it learning piano and languages!)

It’s handwritten notes instead of quick texts. Ordering takeout for a sick friend is nice; cooking and delivering soup is love.

It’s the time we put into our relationships and communities, the red-eye flight to attend a wedding, the volunteer shift at a local event, caring for a sick loved one. It’s showing up for yourself and the people around you, again and again. Friction isn’t always fun, but I’d argue it’s what connects us and makes life feel full.

It’s also the safeguard of democracy, a check against authoritarians running roughshod over their citizens. Due process, protests, and unions all slow things down, and for good reason. Friction keeps power in check and protects ordinary lives from being steamrolled by efficiency and greed. Sure, too much red tape breeds frustration (as detailed in the eye-opening book Abundance), but too little leads to chaos.

Does it slow things down? Yes...usually for the betterment of the individual’s every day life and a feeling of security instead of leaving them wondering when the next rug will be yanked out.

La Dolce Vita

My Italian grandmother knew La Dolce Vita, the sweet lifestyle embracing simple pleasures, beauty, and a slower pace of living. She was surrounded by people she loved with treasures from her travels on every shelf. With a glass of Crown Royal and Jeopardy at 7pm, grandkids rampaging in the next room, she couldn’t have been happier.

Well, La Dolce Vita IS friction: home-cooked meals, real human messiness, Christmas trees falling over, one destination on a trip instead of five cities in a week. Slowing the hell down.

The life people dream about isn’t based in efficiency at all. It’s all about slow interactions where you engage with people in your community. Running into someone at the grocery store, chatting amiably at the dog park with people you don’t know, but whose bulldog Bruno you adore.

My parents model this beautifully: meal trains for sick neighbors, a shared community truck, my mom walking a friend’s dog for months, my dad’s friend reading poetry to him after surgery.

What are we rushing toward?

Efficiency connects us to things. Friction connects us to people. In a world where everything is one click away, maybe the only real act of care left is giving someone your time.

Otherwise, we end up fast-forwarding through life. But to what end? As Jay Jennifer Matthews writes in Radically Condensed Instructions for Being Just as You Are:

“We can not get anything out of life. There is no outside where we could take this thing to. There is no little pocket situated outside of life, which would steal life’s provisions and squirrel them away.”

Maybe friction is just the courage to slow down, to be fully present.

A few parting ideas:

-Be ruthlessly efficient with things you don’t enjoy. Put the soy milk on auto-order! Use that dishwasher and washing machine! Book a DMV appointment vs. standing in line for 2 hours!

-Meanwhile, leave space for serendipitous interactions that result in connection. Maybe don’t schedule every weekend? Leave your phone in a drawer for a few hours a day.

-Try not meticulously planning a trip. Make like Kevin Kelly and keep some of it engaging rather than relaxing.

-Finally, embrace inefficiency for what it is: a way to strengthen bonds and feel like you’re part of a community. It’s okay not to do everything in our lives. Maybe doing a few things really well with our full attention is enough.

Winds of change here in Oregon, fall splendor ceding to blustery, dark nights. I’m not ready…

Power bouncing off the Traipsing About trampoline this week:

• Friction for the win (final essay in this series)

• Very bad advice…and not even the unsolicited kind.

• How to be indispensable in the age of AI.

• Traipsing Tidbits:

  • AI (Sh)Art

  • The power of a few lines

  • YouTube at its best

In case you missed it: My last three newsletters contained parts of a series on friction, including:

1. In praise of friction and how it builds our character.

2. How friction strengthens friendships

3. How friction is the story in our lives, even if it requires Grandma’s Christmas tree falling over.

Also, I loved this recent email from Traipsing reader Mark sent me after my “friction is story” post. He was about to launch into a big trip (trekking in Kyrgyzstan, amongst other adventures…y’all Traipsers are cool!):

“Your Substack today. Right…on….target. Thank you for another reminder of how uncertainty, apprehension and nervousness, and the new invariably bring lasting memories and growth. It helps me to mitigate my anxiety and instead embrace the opportunity.”

Friction forces intention and connection

In my past few newsletters, I’ve tackled the concept of friction. Since then, I keep noticing it everywhere. (Call me a dude with a hammer looking for friction, whatevs!)

Scott Galloway warns that AI companions create “connections forged without friction, where intimacy is artificial.” Cognitive science researcher Eva Keiffenheim urges us to “put the friction back in” so we don’t offload too much thinking to machines. And Cal Newport reminds us that a bit of resistance can tame our questing simian minds’ dependence on them. Limit timers for apps? Pffft, monkeys can figure that out! Gotta put the phone in a drawer.

Even finance, that temple of efficiency, benefits from friction. The IEX stock exchange slowed down trading signals, as Michael Lewis chronicled in the excellent book Flash Boys.

Friction at a personal level

No friction in our lives runs the risk of transforming us into dreadful, entitled caricatures, someone like Harry Potter’s revolting cousin Dudley. Without effort and pushback (aka people telling us when we screw up), how can we possibly develop the grit and tenacity to thrive while avoiding becoming a stinky turd of a human?

As Scott Galloway puts it in his essay Love Algorithmically,

“We need people to judge us, to point out when we say something stupid. Friction and conflict are key to developing resilience and learning how to function in society.”

Friction shows up in the burn of a workout, in researching sustainable products vs. single-use crap. It’s the effort it takes to learn a skill, digging in for dozens or hundreds of hours. (Wow have I felt it learning piano and languages!)

It’s handwritten notes instead of quick texts. Ordering takeout for a sick friend is nice; cooking and delivering soup is love.

It’s the time we put into our relationships and communities, the red-eye flight to attend a wedding, the volunteer shift at a local event, caring for a sick loved one. It’s showing up for yourself and the people around you, again and again. Friction isn’t always fun, but I’d argue it’s what connects us and makes life feel full.

It’s also the safeguard of democracy, a check against authoritarians running roughshod over their citizens. Due process, protests, and unions all slow things down, and for good reason. Friction keeps power in check and protects ordinary lives from being steamrolled by efficiency and greed. Sure, too much red tape breeds frustration (as detailed in the eye-opening book Abundance), but too little leads to chaos.

Does it slow things down? Yes...usually for the betterment of the individual’s every day life and a feeling of security instead of leaving them wondering when the next rug will be yanked out.

La Dolce Vita

My Italian grandmother knew La Dolce Vita, the sweet lifestyle embracing simple pleasures, beauty, and a slower pace of living. She was surrounded by people she loved with treasures from her travels on every shelf. With a glass of Crown Royal and Jeopardy at 7pm, grandkids rampaging in the next room, she couldn’t have been happier.

Well, La Dolce Vita IS friction: home-cooked meals, real human messiness, Christmas trees falling over, one destination on a trip instead of five cities in a week. Slowing the hell down.

The life people dream about isn’t based in efficiency at all. It’s all about slow interactions where you engage with people in your community. Running into someone at the grocery store, chatting amiably at the dog park with people you don’t know, but whose bulldog Bruno you adore.

My parents model this beautifully: meal trains for sick neighbors, a shared community truck, my mom walking a friend’s dog for months, my dad’s friend reading poetry to him after surgery.

What are we rushing toward?

Efficiency connects us to things. Friction connects us to people. In a world where everything is one click away, maybe the only real act of care left is giving someone your time.

Otherwise, we end up fast-forwarding through life. But to what end? As Jay Jennifer Matthews writes in Radically Condensed Instructions for Being Just as You Are:

“We can not get anything out of life. There is no outside where we could take this thing to. There is no little pocket situated outside of life, which would steal life’s provisions and squirrel them away.”

Maybe friction is just the courage to slow down, to be fully present.

A few parting ideas:

-Be ruthlessly efficient with things you don’t enjoy. Put the soy milk on auto-order! Use that dishwasher and washing machine! Book a DMV appointment vs. standing in line for 2 hours!

-Meanwhile, leave space for serendipitous interactions that result in connection. Maybe don’t schedule every weekend? Leave your phone in a drawer for a few hours a day.

-Try not meticulously planning a trip. Make like Kevin Kelly and keep some of it engaging rather than relaxing.

-Finally, embrace inefficiency for what it is: a way to strengthen bonds and feel like you’re part of a community. It’s okay not to do everything in our lives. Maybe doing a few things really well with our full attention is enough.

Very bad advice

Morgan Housel, author of the fantastic book The Psychology of Money, knows that showing people what to NOT to do is more powerful than being bossy. (I’m still learning.) My favorites from his essay Very Bad Advice:

• Envy others’ success without having a full picture of their lives, or (similarly) compare your behind-the-scenes life to others’ curated highlight reel.

• Associate net worth with self-worth (for you and others), and also automatically associate wealth with wisdom.

• Judge other people at their worst and yourself at your best.

• Assume that all your success is due to hard work and all your failure is due to bad luck. (How much of any success I’ve had is mostly due to low interest rates and a booming economy in the 2010s?!)

Check out the full list. I’ve only fallen prey to ohhhh 75% of them in my lifetime, how about you? (“Value the appearance of looking busy” in my first job, for example.)

3 human skills that make you irreplaceable in an AI world

I dig the Prof G newsletter for its timely, humorous take on markets and trends. These important skills we need in the age of AI resonate with me:

Curation:

Time and attention are becoming even scarcer. Because of that, taste — the ability to identify what is worth paying attention to and what isn’t — is becoming increasingly important.

Curiosity:

To curate well, you need a big library to draw from. And to build that, you need curiosity — the willingness to explore outside your lane, to chase ideas that don’t have an immediate, or obvious, payoff.

As Robert Greene describes in Mastery, progress begins with anomalies, strange outliers or overlooked curiosities that spark deeper investigation. [D’s note: this reminds me of the excellent book Range by David Epstein.]

Connection:

AI can summarize, analyze, and even write with fluency. What it can’t do is care. It doesn’t build trust, show emotional investment, or make someone say “I want that person in the room.”

—

Overall, I’d argue that basically no one wants AI in the room, just doing the dirty work behind the scenes while humans shine. Hey, a boy can dream! We’ll see how it all pans out.

Traipsing Tidbits

• The Oatmeal’s brilliant take on AI Art: “…I find out it’s AI art. Then I feel deflated, grossed out, and maybe a little bit bored.” This echoes my feelings exactly. Call me old-fashioned, but I like my artists to have worked hard, dammit!

• How does this (non-AI) artist convey so much movement and life with a few strokes of a graphite pen?

• Movie rec: Listers: A Glimpse Into Extreme Birdwatching: Do I bird? No. Did I laugh my ass off and admire the brotherly relationship and beautiful filming of birds in this YouTube doc? Yes, yes I did. Trust me on this one.

This Traipsing About newsletter has left the station.

Unsolicited advice from entrepreneur Nat Elison:

If you’re in your 20s and have any aspiration to start a business or work for yourself or make a dramatic career change, you should do that as soon as possible. Ideally today.

You don’t appreciate how little time you have to easily go after it and how much harder it’s going to be later.

To this, I’d add if you have any aspiration for big, open-ended travel, do it in your early 20s! Your future self will thank you profusely.

Onward,

Dakota

I just read astute travel writer Paul Theroux’s book Ghost Train to the Eastern Star. In it, he follows a route that he traveled 33 years prior…and lo and behold, I traversed much of the same in my year-long escapade overseas after college, including going from Berlin to Bangkok via train and bus. AND he did it in 2006, the same year I was out and about exploring Myanmar, China, Vietnam, and so on!

So trippy reading his perspective as a life-long travel writer about the same places I visited. Since I was only 24 on my first trip abroad and very mature goofing around, his sharp eye and research helps shine new light on past memories. I love the concept of revisiting past locations like that.

Otherwise, we’re just cruising here in Oregon while enjoying fall vibes, fun in the mountains, and excellent camping trips. Wildfires have served up smoke here or there, but hey, such is life in a mountain town these days. (I say with equanimity while almost forgetting a day last week where pure rage was the primary emotion.)

Blazing hot off the Traipsing About press this week:

• No friction, no story (Part 3 in my friction series)

• Smoke risk quantified

• Traipsing Tidbits:

In case you missed it: Last newsletter, I continued my series on friction with how it strengthens friendships; the first essay was in praise of friction.

Friction is the story

Most holidays blur together for me, but not the one where a fully-laden Christmas tree toppled onto my flailing grandma as my raucous Italian family laughed uncontrollably. At least one of my aunts peed her pants.

In fact, my best stories are rarely (never?) about things going smoothly. They’re about friction, be it a family holiday or a far-flung trip.

I'm talking about things like a Hawaiian wave soaking me and Chelsea during our wedding photos. Or a small child throwing up all over Chelsea and our traveling companions on an overnight train in China. Or perhaps bike trips laced with lightning storms, broken derailleurs and bike frames, or weirdos in a Walmart parking lot scaring the bejeebus out of us as we "stealth camped" in our van overnight.

Yes, please, serve me some friction with a side of unknown! For dessert, I'd like some randomness.

After all, in storytelling, conflict = plot. In life, friction = memory. Perfect beach vacations are lovely, sure, but they're yawn-tastic in a story. "We went to the beach. It was sunny. We drank cocktails. The end.”

A family dinner where everything goes right is pleasant. The one where I accidentally spilled an entire pitcher of grape juice and my grandpa's blood pressure pinged off the moon is engraved forever in my memory. (My poor grandparents!)

As Kevin Kelly puts it in his excellent “50 Years of Travel Tips,” travel comes in two flavors: retreat (recharging with margaritas on the beach) or engage (leaning into uncertainty and surprise). Craig Mod describes it as stepping into the unknown.

I just call it friction. The kind of travel that leaves you changed, with stories worth telling. Like my brother and me spending six days on the Trans-Siberian Railroad, building a makeshift sail to push air into our sweltering cabin (Paul Theroux would have been proud). Well, until furious Russian train attendants tore it down. Annoying in the moment (gawd it was hot in Siberia), unforgettable in hindsight.

When people travel, they often try to erase friction, researching every corner of a destination until no surprises remain. The Airbnb, landmarks, restaurants, and the coffee or croissant spot are already mapped. (What about the toilets; better check those in advance!)

But what if you left a little to chance? Showed up without an agenda, without Instagram’s highlight reel guiding your every move? Whatever magic a destination holds gets hammered out by too many tourists anyway; a selfie stick to the eye wrecks any experience.

Sure, some friction is just hassle. In 2006, me traveling without a phone or laptop meant hunting for internet cafés just to book a ticket, or fending off shouting hotel touts after stepping off a bus or boat. Not fun, not a good story.

There's a place for it though. Lisa Abend takes a delightful modern twist on this. "Each month, I go to a place in Europe I’ve never been before, travel around entirely offline, and bring back stories of my adventures."

Even with cell phones, other friction opens doors. On a three-month bike trip through Europe, we left our route unplanned and commented on a vegan food blog in Belgium. That led to three unexpected days staying with the blogger near Bruges, plus connections with friends in Ghent. Scheduled and booked, it never would have happened.

This has been true on every journey I’ve taken: Every time I leave things open, serendipity shows up. Over and over, friction isn’t inconvenience, it’s the spark for stories and relationships.

That isn’t just true on the road. Life itself works the same way. The moments we remember aren’t when everything went smoothly, but when things went fabulously sideways. Grape juice spills and power outages shake things up!

Perfect trips and seamless dinners fade. At the end of our days, what we’ll remember are the stories, our time with people, whether close family and friends or a stranger eager to share a piece of their life.

Friction becomes story. So if a Christmas tree happens to topple onto grandma this year… well, you might just be gifting your family the best holiday memory yet.

Give the tree a little bump with your hip.

What does smoke do to us anyway?

Since wildfire smoke is now part of life, I decided to do more digging into the health impacts. My goal: figure out what the health risks in various Air Quality Index (AQI) numbers at low effort levels vs. during intense exercise.

Long-term wildfire smoke exposure hasn’t been studied much because, well, it’s a relatively new thing. Still, there’s the Berkeley Earth cigarette equivalence air pollution metric, which draws a comparison between bad air quality and smoking cigarettes. With a little ChatGPT help, I put together a ciggies spreadsheet for various AQIs and effort levels.

For example, being outside in 100 AQI with low exertion for 24 hours is the same as smoking 1.61 cigarettes. Three hours of hard exercise is 1.81 cigs. So a weekend camping trip with three activities would be like smoking 8-9 ciggies. Yummm…not. But a one-hour bike ride or walk with Chelsea in 75 AQI…? No biggie.

This is useful for me when I'm deciding if the mental health benefits of getting outside are worth the risk. Caveats: a) I’m no PhD researcher and b) the absolute risk of disease for you depends on many factors, including comorbidities. Do your own research to figure out how this would actually affect you. BUT, if you’re feeling stir-crazy and at risk of self-immolation, I say it’s probably worth heading out the door to do something if it’s not Smoke Armageddon outside.

That said, Berkeley Earth’s final statement on their website is that “air pollution is arguably the greatest environmental catastrophe in the world today." Now we just gotta learn how to navigate it. (Blue Air filters are our go-to.)

Traipsing Tidbits

1. Flashback to a post I wrote about buddies vs. friends:
   Buddies are people you do stuff with.
   Friends are people who are committed to you becoming wiser.
   And you’re committed to them becoming wiser.

2. This modern Where’s Waldo is powerful, especially the one of people walking up a ramp looking at their phones…and falling off like the video game lemmings.

3. If I were a parent, I’d definitely want my kids to play on high-risk playgrounds like this one. Hell, I want one!

4. People sure are good at stuff, including this Yo-Yo tricks world champ.

Quote for the road:

“I always felt lucky on a train, as on this one. So many other travelers are hurrying to the airport, to be interrogated and frisked and their luggage searched for bombs.

They would be better off on a national railway, probably the best way of getting a glimpse of how people actually live—the back yards, the barns, the hovels, the side roads and slums, the telling facts of village life, the misery that airplanes fly over.

Yes, the train takes more time, and many trains are dirty, but so what? Delay and dirt are the realities of the most rewarding travel."

Paul Theroux, Ghost Train to the Eastern Star

This Traipsing About newsletter has left the station.

Unsolicited advice: leave some unplanned time in your next trip…and treasure the mistakes at family events!

Onward,

Dakota

Since last time, I’ve had the pleasure of a variety of summer fun, including a camping trip to Mt. Hood and a fabulous piano concert during a music festival. Oregon continues to miraculously dodge summer smoke and I am soaking it UP, baby.

Hot off the Traipsing About press this week:

• Messy friendships for the win.

• Bonking (the athletic kind).

• 10,000 steps is a marketing concept?!

• Traipsing Tidbits.

In case you missed it: Last newsletter, I introduced a new mini-series about friction in our lives, starting with how it builds character. This time, a different angle:

Strengthening friendships with friction

My first year in Bend, I learned how a broken toe can build a friendship.

I'd taken a new friend on a group run on tricky terrain. At one point, he dropped back while I was up around the bend with another runner. I waited a bit...no sign of him.

Huh, weird. Oh well, let's climb up to the waterfall ahead!

On my way back down the trail, I came upon my friend, now limping along. He'd fallen and broken his toe while I was cavorting ahead. Cue awkward moment.

Kudos to him, he leaned in and told me how he felt. Stammering my way through that conversation with him cemented our friendship in a way that wouldn't have happened otherwise. (His openness to me sounding like a penitent idiot helped.)

Contrast stammering with perfectly sculpting all communication, whether belaboring a text response or simply asking ChatGPT what to say. A perfect response that feels like winning in the moment actually robs us of one of the prime opportunities in communication. You guessed it: FRICTION.

Consider being in conflict with your partner or friend. They send a perfectly worded text or email to you explaining things and taking responsibility.

My god, have they done years of therapy and meditate every morning? Does it say "Aspiring Dalai Lama" on their LinkedIn profile?

Nope: they admit that ChatGPT wrote the entire thing.

Cue the air rushing out of a balloon as the conversation crashes: FWEEEEEEET.

Do you feel closer to them? Do you trust them more?

Hell. No. Not in a million therapy sessions.

That's because emotional friction (conflicts, misunderstandings, compromise!) creates a feeling of closeness.

In the same way that surmounting a tough work project or hard physical experience brings us closer together, navigating hard conversations strengthens trust. The messy conversations shows us what people are made of, that they care enough to try.

Messiness (ahem, friction) can also be a fantastic signaling tool for knowing when enough is enough. For instance, one friendship blew up after a joke of mine went awry. I apologized profusely, but my friend refused any attempt at repair. In fact, the trip ended with him driving off in a huff, throwing a gift I'd gotten him out the window on the way out.

Reflecting later, I realized I didn't want to try additional repair. I'd ignored other red flags in the past (oops), but this flag had flapped in the first hard breeze and snapped me in the face. Buh byyyye.

On the flip side, with close friends, I’ll step up and admit to being a jackass. That’s not just an apology, it’s proof I value the relationship enough to limp through the awkward moments. Because when the dust settles, friction isn’t what breaks us apart. It’s the broken toes, bad jokes, and messy conversations that prove we’re worth holding together.

What the bonk?!

There are many endurance athletes in the Traipsing audience, which means plenty of you have experienced that feeling of bonking during a long athletic outing. I, on the other hand, always manage my fueling perfectly.

Wait… Except last weekend. And on basically every bikepacking trip I’ve ever done. *sigh*

Anyway, I know about trying to get 60-90g of carbs per hour during exercise, but I’d never thought of The Bonk the way it’s explained here:

Glucose is the body’s preferred fuel source when the intensity of exercise gets above about 65% of VO₂ max; an intensity above which most serious endurance endeavors are undertaken. That’s because carbohydrates can be burned without large amounts of oxygen, which is in shorter supply when you’re working hard.

But, when the carbs start to run out (and if they’re not adequately replaced by regularly ingesting them), fatty acids need to be burned to produce energy instead. The burning of fat can release a hell of a lot of energy, but it requires way more oxygen, so a ‘bonk’ is really just nature’s highly persuasive way of slowing you down to the point where sufficient oxygen can be provided for you to use fat as your primary fuel source, so you can limp home and collapse on the sofa.

The article goes on to say:

In all, glycogen generally provides about 90 to 120 minutes' worth of endogenous (stored) fuel for pretty high intensity exercise before levels drop to the extent that performance is substantially impaired.

Interestingly, this is why ‘hitting the wall’ is so common in the later stages of a marathon - that 18-22 mile zone is right when many people run out of gas.

I still prefer to get my fuel from real food, but maybe it’s time for me to consider adding something to my water bottles?

10,000 steps, my ass

Did you know the whole 10,000 steps a day thing was a Japanese pedometer marketing campaign in the 1960s? Walking, smalking.

But wait! Before you toss your walking shoes in the trash, read on…

Because a new meta-analysis found that walking kicks ass. 7,000 steps a day is associated with significant health benefits, with the most dramatic benefit for moderate step counts compared to low. (Basically, getting off our duff and moving around is great for us.)

Increasing from 2,000 to just 5,000 steps/day can dramatically improve oh-so-many things:

• Blood sugar control

• Insulin sensitivity

• Blood pressure

• Inflammation

• Mental health

By the way, the original steps number was chosen because the Japanese character for 10,000 resembles a person walking. The device was called Manpo-kei, which translates to “10,000 steps meter.”

Traipsing Tidbits

1. Flashback to eleven years ago when we surrendered to the heat and wind while pedaling across Montana enroute to Maine.

2. If you need the color for touch-up paint on your vehicle, the door jamb in the vehicle has the code printed on the sticker.

3. Recently I gobbled up the delicious writing in Orbital, the Booker-price winner by Samantha Harvey.

4. Love love love these miniature sculptures mixing a Renaissance style with commentary on our devotion to screens.

5. I wrote a post for The Cross-Eyed Pianist about going from frustation to fulfillment.

That’s a wrap for this Traipsing About newsletter.

Unsolicited advice: next time you’ve got a chance to have a real, awkward conversation with a friend, lean in!

Onward,

Dakota

P.S. Throwback: 105 million views can’t be wrong about the famous honey badger.

Thanks for reading Traipsing About! I appreciate your time and attention in a world where it’s a precious commodity.

I’m back from a break from newslettering, a pause to refill the well with some old-fashioned Bend summer living. Days chock-full of camping trips, biking and hiking, swimming, eating berries from the garden, time with Chelsea and friends, lots of reading, and not enough piano.

Just what I needed—I’ve got a head full of great (IMO!) ideas that’ll hit your inbox in coming months. Fair warning.

Hot off the Traipsing About press this week:

• In praise of friction

• Hibernating for love

• Thoughts on overtourism

In case you missed it: before my summer break, I wrote about selling our Sprinter van, a post I needed to write to feel closure on that important chapter of our life. So fun to revisit all the old adventures, and also to scheme fresh new ones with our truck and Airstream.

(For those who expressed concern, all of the old van posts are still around for reference. Except for the comments, which sadly were lost when I moved to Substack. Oh well…onward!)

In Praise of Friction

I want more friction in my life—not less.

Wait, whaaat? You want the WALL-E life?! Just hand me a sippy cup and a beach chair, brosef.

Um, no thanks. Plus I know you, wise Traipsing reader, wouldn’t ever say that either.

Because here’s the thing: friction gets a bad rap—but it’s often where meaning, growth, and connection happen. In a world obsessed with smooth, seamless efficiency, I’m here to argue for the value of (some) things being just a little harder.

As the wise Anthony De Mello writes,

"Happy events make life delightful but they do not lead to self-discovery and growth and freedom. That privilege is reserved to the things and persons and situations that cause us pain."

By the way, I’m not talking about the shitty friction like Bluetooth in the car inexplicably not syncing or going back to hand laundering my clothes. No way, I love modern conveniences—I’m keeping my iPhone!

Nope, I’m talking about friction as the obstacle enroute to a goal, the delayed gratification, the forced pause to make a considered move.

For me, friction creates a life filled with intention. More deliberate choices, not just being shepherded around by a digital overlord. More time with people and a stronger sense of community. More adventures and better stories. Steering the ship like a badass pirate, not stuck below deck wondering where it’s headed.

So for the next handful of Traipsing newsletters, I’m diving into this idea—with a short essay each week. Let’s start with how…

Friction builds character

The struggle and the time—ahem, friction—spent learning or doing anything makes it meaningful. It’s where we develop perseverance, confidence, and resilience. It’s how we avoid blowing away like a beach ball in the wind anytime things get hard.

Think about it: what skill or experience you’re proud of came easily?

Do people who inherit money brag about it? Nope. Anyone who boasts about the gleaming Mercedes their daddy gave them is basically broadcasting, I’ve never done anything hard in my life. (Cya, sucka!)

Same goes for compliments. “Wow, I love your landscaping” hits differently than “You have lovely eyes.” Why? Because one took effort; the other was received. (Thanks, Mom and Dad—I love my eyeball Mercedes!)

For me, if music skills or languages were simply downloaded into my brain and fingers, the satisfaction levels would be zilch, nulla, nada. I've earned the ability to create music from 88 black and white keys or speak Italian through difficult, delicious effort. The process and journey is a huge chunk of the reason it matters.

Compare that to AI, which can crank out a song, painting, or piece of writing in the time it took me to write this sentence.

Our superpower as humans is that we actually get experience the world—in all its glorious friction. To be surprised by things, to feel joy, to dive deep into a new skill without needing to know why.

In fact, the great Russian novelist Tolstoy wrote about this necessary striving in Anna Karenina and War and Peace, where characters find fulfillment not in luxury or power, but in humble effort, relationships, and moral development. Science fiction writer Isaac Asimov has similar themes in his amazing Foundation series—he believed that human progress—through science, reason, and curiosity—is inherently meaningful.

I’d argue this is why people don’t give a ferret’s fart about AI music or books. No friction, no effort or sweat behind it. Just content (ugh). No wonder people recently raged at Spotify for promoting AI band The Velvet Sundown, which fronted as flesh and blood musicians.

In short, friction is the burning feeling in our brains when we're making connections, creating, building something of value. It’s a core part of being human.

And to that, I yell from the Traipsing About rooftop: Gimme more!

Next newsletter: friction as an intention focuser.

Hibernating at 60

Recently businessman/venture capitalist Brad Feld wrote on his excellent blog about “turning into a pumpkin” on Halloween, his 60th birthday. For him, that means going back into hibernation after a stint of public-facing activity to promote a new book. I love his take on how he’s approaching it:

I have no idea how long that hibernation will last, or if it will be permanent. While I reflect on the past three months of being out of hibernation, a lot of things I’ve been doing are in the “like” category, but none of them make the “love” category, which now is only four things (spending time with Amy and close friends, reading, writing (non-fiction, fiction, and code), and running/hiking).

My goal is to continue to shift more of my time to the love category, fulfill my work commitments, all while embracing the third third of life as I wander into my 60s.

Seeing someone like Brad laser focus inspires me to ditch my likes and focus on the loves. What’s cool is that he’s not checking out—he’s doubling down on the value and wisdom of prioritizing those closest to him and his most impactful, life-affirming activities.

A different way to travel

I loved this essay by Craig Mod about overtourism in Japan—and everywhere.

This section was the perfect description of how I want to travel. It encapsulates why I dig bike touring and am learning languages:

These [Best of Class tourists] are folks that buoy the chest, elevate the soul (like witnessing a person stand on an escalator and just stare into the distance, refusing the Siren call of their smartphone).

I don’t know if there’s some Platonic or deontic mode of travel, but in my opinion, the most rewarding point of travelling is: to sit with, and spend time with The Other (even if the place / people aren’t all that different).

To go off the beaten track a bit, just a bit, to challenge yourself, to find a nook of quietude, and to try to take home some goodness (a feeling, a moment) you might observe off in the wilds of Iwate or Aomori. That little bundle of goodness, filtered through your own cultural ideals — that’s good globalism at work.

With an ultimate goal of doing all this without imposing on or overloading the locals. To being an additive part of the economy (financially and culturally), to commingling with regulars without displacing them.

Put this Traipsing About newsletter up on blocks, because it’s out of gas.

Something to ponder: Is there an area of your life where adding friction might improve things for you?

Onward,

Dakota

P.S. A great YouTube short on the bad friction in tech.

Thanks for reading Traipsing About! I appreciate your time and attention in a world where it’s a precious commodity. If you’ve got a minute, hit reply and let me know what your favorite city or area in Europe is…cuz I’m scheming, yo!

Around here, this week I voted in my first Italian election! First time my citizenship has felt real. Voting kicked off an unexpected feeling of connection to Italy.

In other news…

Bidding adieu to our Sprinter van

“Put a sign on it too!” Chelsea said, gesturing at the Sprinter.
Me, shrugging: “People don’t buy vans from a sign.”

Three weeks later, I caved and made the sign.

The next day, I shook hands on a deal.

Just like that, it was gone.

Selling the van was bittersweet—a weird mix of relief, nostalgia, and a soft punch to the gut. Tears in my eyes the morning of the sale!

But it reminded me, yet again, that listening to my wife is usually the right move.

Fittingly, she was the one who lit the van life match in the first place.

We were in Steamboat Springs, Colorado in fall of 2012 when we saw a cute Westfalia van with a For Sale sign in the window.

“What if we just bought that and drove it home?” Chelsea asked, casually taking a different fork in the road of our life.

We didn’t buy that van, but that night, sitting by the fire, we burrowed down a van rabbit hole. By bedtime, we knew two things:

1. We wanted a van.

2. Sprinters seemed like the way to go.

We were hooked.

The Wild West

Of course, back then, in the pre-Instagram wilderness of 2012, van life wasn’t a movement. More like a fringe experiment conducted by old guys on internet forums who argued about bolt strength and over-engineered everything.

Sprinter vans were contractor vehicles, not tiny homes stuffed full of outdoor gear and Instagrammable Millennials.

Somehow, the momentum built and we took the train to Eugene in early 2013 and drove a new Sprinter van home. It was an empty cargo version, a blank slate for our dream rig.

Baptism by graffiti out of the way, we leapt into the DIY construction phase. Luckily, I have a few things going for me in that realm: a mechanical engineering degree, experience with construction, and over-confidence.

With such bonafides, we figured out our layout, electrical system, and bed height. We lived in a driveway-free house in Portland, so I did all the work parked on the street. In between calls with clients, I’d scrabble about installing the project du jour.

Six months later, I heard the neighbor’s kid yell, “Dad, why is that guy always out working on his van in front of our house?”

Buddy, I hear you. I heeeear you.

Through all this, C and I weren’t exactly sure how we were going to use the van. We just knew that we needed to get the hell out of the office and the city more often and go have some outdoor adventures.

Looking back, however, we were building a door that would give us options! This parallels with choices we’ve made since—like me pursuing Italian citizenship, for example. We may not have a specific vision, but an unlocked door to living in Europe feels good. If you don’t build doors to walk through (or a van to sleep in), you’re going to be stuck in the same room forever.

Anyway, the idea of a four-month trip down the coast of California only popped up months after buying the van, sometime in summer of 2013.

Three months later, we were on the road.

The trip launch

As all big trip departures go, ours was organized and totally unstressful. Well, except for madly dashing about sweeping the porch as our new tenants drove up…and stuffing tools and all manner of possessions into the van moments before that.

Coming clean: OMG, getting an old house ready for tenants is so.much.work. Chelsea spearheaded the operation, selling possessions and dialing in the rental while I worked and built out the van.

Fortunately, we weren’t launching directly into the four-month trip. Instead, we drove north to Idaho in November to drop off our kitty Oliver at C’s parents. They had kindly agreed to kitty sit during our travels.

The van was still not ready for our trip. Indeed, I’d saved a few projects for Idaho because C’s fabulous dad Steve has a driveway and ALL the tools in his garage. He also is generous with his time. (For those who don’t know my and C’s story, Steve was also my high school chemistry teacher.)

For three weeks in November, I wrenched on the van. I slithered around under the van installing the diesel heater as cold sleet dripped down my neck, then finalized the cabinets after I built a snowman.

Eventually, the van was ready to rip, though it still lacked indoor lights, running water, or a toilet.

No big deal—Chelsea and I were only doing a four month trip. We’d get a sense of how things worked and finish things up when we got home in the spring.

Sometimes, unsuspectedly, a few months can morph into three years…

Hey, once the door is open and you’re through it, why not? Especially if you’ve got supportive parents who like cats!

The Road Trip

Oh, the sheer freedom of taking off as adults with our little house on our backs, a turtle shell of comfort.

With no schedule, we could stop anywhere we liked and leave when we pleased. Lunches overlooking beaches, stops to visit dear friends, SO much time in nature. I was still running my business remotely, but had started to hire people to take on my work load.

Our sights also expanded beyond the van. After I surprised Chelsea with a birthday bike tour from L.A. to San Diego, she got a wild hare to do a big bike tour.

Two months later, we parked the van at her parent’s house in Idaho and spent the next 3.5 months pedaling 4,000 miles to Maine. If we hadn’t already been uprooted and flexible, there’s no way that trip would have happened.

Same with living in New York City for two different stints, volunteering at a farm sanctuary for a month, a Spanish language immersion in Tulum, multiple months bike touring around Europe, or exploring Iceland by van and on foot.

There’s something magical about just going, and the van enabled that. In those three years of traveling, we probably only spent 1.5 of them actually traveling in the Sprinter, but the mindset that it kicked off transcended a little gray van.

Letting go of the van

As fabulous as all those experiences were, after three years we were ready to downshift, landing in the fabulous mountain town of Bend, Oregon. Chelsea launched into community building and volunteering, creating groups and getting involved around town while I held down the financial house and tried every outdoor sport.

With so much nature access, we didn’t feel the pull to get outta town as much as we had in Portland. Even better, many van life friends came to visit us. In no way were we living “van life,” but I still identified with the ethos of it.

Plus I enjoyed the (very niche) fame I had from writing this blog! Getting recognized by readers at trailheads, on bikepacking trips, or in a Canadian laundromat felt good, like I had friends everywhere.

But with that identity fading and less need to travel given Bend’s nature access, the van mostly sat unused other than short trips. Still, in no way did we consider selling—it felt like an appendage, a part of our history versus Just A Vehicle.

In 2020, my energy dramatically shifted as the pandemic fucked up the world gave me a chance to reassess things. I fell in love with piano and learning languages, sold my ski stuff and took a break from rock climbing. Constantly being physically active felt less fulfilling for me.

I started perseverating, belaboring the thought “do we need the van?” It represented a big chunk of cash and maintenance energy/costs just sitting in our driveway. When I traveled, I could always stay with friends/family or just *gasp* sleep in the back of the car or in a tent.

Maybe it was time for a change.

Goodbye to my old friend

It took me forever to finally make the decision. For over a year, I went back and forth, even as we bought an Airstream trailer for more comfortable travel and barely used the van.

We made a big pros and cons list, but that still didn’t push me over the edge. Finally, Chelsea and I were out walking while I belabored the van when she cracked (lovingly).

“I think we need to sell the van to free you from the constant rumination!” Whammo, the selling process was underway.

Taking the plunge was surprisingly hard. The key was depersonalizing the van, which involved removing any pictures, stickers, or even our custom koi pond curtains that I’d sewn myself.

I’d get a pang looking at a little piece of metal trim that I’d filed down 26 times or remembering the friend who had helped me with a specific project.

In fact, while washing the outside and inside, it felt like I was bathing a dear companion before burial. WTF, it’s just a van, dude! I don’t connect to inanimate objects, do I?

And then…my energy shifted. I started picturing the next owners and how stoked they were going to be. Fresh adventures with a well-maintained, solid rig to take them there! No more deliberation for me! Putting that money in the bank! Only one RV to maintain!

In short, I released the van. The identity around it, that chapter of our lives. I’ve got memories, pictures and friends from that time—I don’t need anything else.

And guess what? The people who bought it the day after I put a sign on it?

They live right down the street, new neighbors who lived in Kathmandu and Alaska for years. They love the history of the van and how I took such great care of it.

They even wanted the old koi pond curtains!

In short, while the original van chapter of our life has concluded, I couldn’t be happier about the ending. I already feel the clarity. Things are simpler.

Who knows… There could be another van down the road. Because if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that I have no idea what the heck is going to happen in the future! I’m going to keep building and unlocking doors to future life experiences.

And listening to Chelsea’s great ideas.

To all you long-time readers, thanks for following along.

Not that this is the end—lots more adventures left for the two of us! Plenty more Traipsing About coming up.

Onward,

Dakota

P.S. Don’t worry, the old van posts are still around. Here’s the original main Adventure Mobile post with links to everything I’ve written about DIY Sprinter builds!

Thank you for reading my thoughts! I appreciate your time and attention in a world where it’s a precious commodity.

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