Travel: 5 Minute Freewrite

One of the things I like most about living in Los Angeles is that the city is so large and culturally diverse that you can take a day-trip in your own town and feel like you've gone traveling.

To distract myself from not-the-worst/not-the-best news, my husband and I took a drive to Little Tokyo, a neighborhood in downtown LA that I haven't spent a ton of time exploring. We found a well-regarded and authentic restaurant that serves both traditional and vegan ramen, we window-shopped and shop-shopped in interesting markets, I drank a bunch of delicious matcha and we explored the James Irvine Japanese Garden at the Japanese American Cultural Center.

My family traveled once or twice a year when I was a kid. Never internationally (well, Canada, but that's barely international from Michigan) but a fair amount within the States. Sometimes to beaches or amusement parks, sometimes to culturally or historically relevant sites. Occasionally to cities, and those were by far my favorite. Any city (of any size larger than the smallish town where I grew up) held my fascination, and I rarely felt more at home in my life than I did as my dad steered the van towards an urban skyline. It's little wonder I took a beeline to a metropolitan area as soon as I could. I still get a tingle driving through favorite parts of LA... or parts that I haven't yet explored. I could live a whole lifetime here and barely scratch the surface.

For Daily Freewrite and Selfie Celebration