Italy jolted me back to life. I had been working as the Bookstore Manager/HR Assistant at a college for going on four years when I got the opportunity to visit Italy. My days were very routine. Get up, go to work, work, come home, panic about not having the energy to focus on photography, who am I?, why don’t I do things anymore, realize it’s 3am, should’ve gone to bed hours ago, one more episode of Boston Legal, fall asleep, wake up, rinse and repeat. I had thought an office job was all I ever wanted after years of hustle, trying to work several jobs I loved in several industries that don’t pay well. Taking this trip to Italy would wipe out my vacation time leaving me with nothing for an entire year. But it was exactly what I needed. We worked our way through Venice, Florence, and Rome, with day trips to the Cinque Terre, Pompeii, and Pisa. It was an opportunity to reconnect with travel photography and to reestablish where I wanted to go with my life.