Isn't it great that we can fly around the world, return home and in a matter of a few days be just like we never left? The same old things keep happening whether we want them to or not. Do you ever wonder what it would be like to have all of your time to do with as you please? What would you do? The luxury of time. Time to think. Time to be.

I looked back on my thoughts while on vacation and I noticed that tourism was not something that we enjoyed. That's actually kind of funny because I desired to see these things, yet once there I don't enjoy the act of tourism. It's kind of a double edged sword. A special sight is singled out and tourist come to see it. The local infrastructure expands to provide services for the tourist. Soon the location grows to accommodate more tourists. Then it becomes touristy or a tourist trap.

In the past couple of years my husband Rob and I have traveled to Ireland, Scotland, England, France, Spain and now Italy. We've learned a great deal from our travels. Now that I see how it really is it's kind of funny. I've dreamed of the opportunity to see for myself the many treasures of our civilization. We walked (many hours/days) on Roman built roads in Spain. We were amazed seeing the famous Pont du Gard aqueduct in the south of France. We went to Rome and saw the ruins of a civilization that we based our government upon. We spent time in Ireland, where the Christian religion was cloistered during the dark ages.

Our country was founded by people of the Western World. The immigrants brought America their knowledge and from them we have the best part of each culture to become American culture. We are fortunate to live in a time when we can travel fairly easily and relatively inexpensively to distant lands as we desire. Seeing the land of our ancestors has been an opportunity to better understand why America is. For all our imperfections America was the dream of the people of Europe and the British empire. And it still is.