Isn’t how we travel like a miniature version of how we go through life, messy in spite of all our careful planning? I highly recommend Luscombe Wild Elderflower bubbly while you are here🥂
A good activity for a rainy day is a visit to the utterly whacky Royal Pavilion. (over the top 19th century chinoiserie.) If you have transport you could also visit Charleston the home of Virginia Wolf and Venessa Bell et.al. That is also fabulously over decorated but in a completely original way. Love 💕 them both.
I’ve just read the Hip Sobriety article you wrote back in July 2015 long before I knew you or it existed. ‘The real consequence of how we view addiction’ That was such a fantastic leap of understanding on your part especially at that time when no one else was even suggesting anything alternative. There is a yawning gulf between getting it 99 % and getting it 100% is there not? It’s as clear as a bell now, after a year and a bit of only getting it 99%. That article sums it up. No wonder it’s so hard when an entire culture and your whole family have swallowed the lie wholesale! It killed one, nearly did for the second, has fooled the one left alive and nearly destroyed me, but I’ve ( only just) seen it for the emperor with no clothes on that it is ( but with a revolver in its hand ).
I spent a week in Hawaii not doing anything but trying to write that piece. It was SO HARD and I deeply, deeply appreciate it that one person read it in 2023. The Pavillion was bananas. Fucking bananas.
Hi Holly, thank you for this piece, it really found me at the right time! I am on a trip through my (our) beloved Sicily, on a bus to Taormina, crying like a fool because today it is my birthday, I am 40 years old, I am sober and clean and I am ALIVE.
I booked this trip on a whim and packed frilly dresses and bikinis but no hats, as if I hadn't been here before, as if I did not know that the sun here can boil your brain into a soup.
I have been travelling on my own for 10+ years and, especially since I got sober, I have more and more let go of the things I MUST do, see, eat. I follow my nose, my intuition, my gut. I don't travel anymore to find the things I think I want, or I am supposed to want, I travel so that what is "for me" can find me. And it always finds me. Last year this time I was on a deserted Sicilian island (Favignana), bored by the strong winds and crushed by my relentless self pity for booking the wrong island at the wrong time of the year. I packed a book with me, so I took it out of the suitcase to pass the time. That book was Pema's "When things fall apart". It hit me like a truck and it did because I was on the wrong island at the wrong time of the year.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts with us, it is always a pleasure to read you.
Hey! I'm in Catania now and can confirm the strong midday sun 🤣. If you want to boil yr brain in Taormina, I suggest you go down to Isola Bella, it was pretty hot the other day. Also full of nasty pink jellifish so dip your toes carefully!
I spend as much time as I can in Brighton & Hove, in fact I’m heading to Hove on Wednesday for 5 days, my best friend lives there and I visit whenever I can. I ALWAYS take the “wrong” clothes and end up borrowing, costs, scarves etc. I have no excuse as I’m coming from Ireland with similar weather! Your piece illuminates that I pack for “holiday me” not actual me, the fictional version that has a whole vision of who she’ll magically turn in to when she step off the plane but she never turns up, there’s just me. So if you see someone as badly dressed as yourself in the coffee shops of Hove do say hi!! X
I lived in Brussels for 8 years, and my near- daily walk to the supermarket brought me right through the city center, always packed with tourists and visitors from around the globe. Tour groups following guides with umbrellas, families, couples with cameras, British stag parties in costumes, all the time. And there were plenty of American tourists dressed how you describe, with weather-appropriate outerwear and new walking shoes. From time to time I would feel jealous that they were experiencing this city in such a leisurely way, in restaurants and through beer tastings before going back to a comfy hotel bed, when I knew the *real* Brussels because I had to live and struggle and survive there (obviously ignoring my own privilege in those envious moments, but the contrasts I saw had truth). But I think what you describe as a "messy" traveler by your/ our/American standards is closer to the normal traveler that I met a hundred times over and that I was when I lived in Europe. Traveling is uncomfortable and we must remain alert in a new situation, which means we're experiencing the world and its people with wide open eyes. To try to package away that discomfort, to keep everything about you the same (as in, closed) when you're somewhere new, is so totally missing the point. Which is to say, I could always pick out the American tourists, and they were never obnoxious like the stereotypes, but when I was thinking clearly, I felt so grateful that none of those constraints applied to me, and I could safely sit on an old church bench with my groceries in hand whenever I wanted and absorb the glory of my surroundings without having to answer to anyone.
Heather thank you for this, that is such a wonderful perspective because you're absolutely right--the imagined ideal (I have) is sanitized and robotic and auto-pilot and maximized. And the reason I do it is to float and see and, as you say, experience the world with eyes wide open, which is exactly what it's been like. "Traveling is uncomfortable and we must remain alert in a new situation." That is so, so good, especially when you translate it to other things. Thanks for this.
This essay was perfection to me. I loved it more than anything else I've ever read by you (no offense to past you or to future you, but lots of kudos to present you). The way you use travel to illustrate the slow process of self acceptance and self love was gorgeously, masterfully done. And it is the reason I am now a paid subscriber.
What a great read Holly. Welcome to the UK and happy travelling. If you’re still in Hove go to Rockwater for great views and food. Hopefully the weather will be kind to you but if nothing else it’ll blow the mental cobwebs away. 😊
I love when your post shows up in my inbox. Always makes me smile in part because I know something somewhere in what you’ve written will make me laugh, and this one did as well. Making someone laugh is such an incredible gift and a kindness. I appreciate how hard you work to get your writing to be the best it can be.
I also love your coat and your scarf. Sorry, I just do. BTW, I also feel like I’m my best self when traveling. And I like being in airports, on planes, in train stations, in nice hotel rooms, I like breakfast buffets. I spent several days in Cefalu last fall, in a little apartment on a narrow old Sicilian side street, and I loved walking a few blocks every morning to a small piazza, through streams of kids heading to school, and having coffee and pastries in the little square, and just watching life go by. I adored it. Or having lunch and early dinner in the Vucaria (sp?) in Palermo, just some simple pasta and an espresso, in a little place off the main alley, and just hanging out.
I got bad advice on getting from Rome to Palermo and then to Cefalu. The plane was three hours late, so I missed the right train connection, which instead of taking one hour from the airport, was going to be two. I threw caution to the winds and negotiated a taxi from Palermo to Cefalu, which cost a fortune and pissed off the driver. Because he underestimated the length of the trip he drove a like a wild man and refused to take me to the door of my apartment, dropped me off nearby sort of.
But I got there at a reasonable hour and walked to a lively outdoor seaside restaurant and had just gotten my meal when a huge bird took a giant shit on my head. I raced to the nearest bathroom where they misunderstood me and told me to dry my hair under the blow dryer. When I yelled bird shit a few times (universal translation ) they got it and whipped into action, with soap, water and tons of paper towels. I finished my adequate meal with great views and walked back to my little apartment where I had reserved a 3 rd floor room not realizing that in Italy and many places that’s really the fourth floor, and basically like climbing Macchu Pichu, so I dragged my enormous suitcase up a thousand steps with the help of the landlady who was about 5 feet tall and stronger than me (which is not saying much). I fell into bed, exhausted, trying to drown out the roar of many motorbikes roaring up and down the street.
HOWEVER, I awoke to a beautiful sunrise over the Mediterranean as I walked out in the rooftop patio that came with my Macchu Picchu apartment, and then strolled down to the piazzo where the nearby bakery brought coffee and pastries to my little table on the square.
SO, all that craziness and to some degree poor planing and lack of due diligence on my part rewarded me with some great stories and memories and isn’t that what travel should be about: the situations you have to roll with, the characters you meet, the surprises- oh, how I love the surprises, at some point perhaps I can tell you about my wild Irish/English/Ukrainian singalong in a hotel lobby in Rome last May. And so poignant given the Ukraine situation at that time (and still.). The scenery, the food, sometimes, but especially the stories and the memories. Like the one you described.
oh I love this Joe! I also love planes and trains and hotel rooms and bad buffets, and that walk in the morning down some italian street to get your coffee and pastry is the best part. I just did that. One time I took the train from Messina to Naples and you know you have to get on the ferry, and I had only two pairs of socks or something and my feet were really stinky and some guy ran into my coach and threw socks at me. Clean socks my size. lol.
That’s hysterical. The right size. It’s almost like he went shopping ahead of time.
I had a recent tour guide, in India, who said:” Bad roads ( and long ones) lead to great places.” I would add lead to great stories and memories as well.
Apr 9, 2023·edited Apr 10, 2023Liked by Holly Whitaker
I've been brain toggling about whether to take a few days off of teaching and actually go somewhere. Like, get on a plane, and not plan it, and just do it. I've spent too many days worrying about the mess, and not buying the ticket. This piece felt like a mirror to my thoughts; why am I consumed with "seeing and doing the thing"? Eating the right thing in the right place? The single female solo travel. I felt very empowered by the way this piece was written. It's again this idea of the subtle aggression against who we are...if I don't want to perfectly plan it, if that isn't coming naturally to me (so much as to create a deterrent me from even going), why am I wasting so much time? Buying a roundtrip mess ticket.
I mean that’s one of the ‘upsides’ of how I am, I don’t think, I just go. And I don’t think I’ve ever regretted just going. I hope you have so much fun.
I loved reading this. Travel is so magical and messy in its own right. It makes me notice all the ways I’m on autopilot in my own life because there is no routine and no absolutes, from coffee to bathrooms, to weather, to smells, its 100% groundlessness. A daily experiment, so many surprises. Also, i think Bob Seger may have actually meant to sing “Working on my night cheese”. ❤️
Omg- I thought *for sure* that was a Holly Original. Hilarious that Seger covered a Liz Lemon hit. Good for him. Also: Have you considered getting into tv writing? I think you would slay working with someone awesome like Shonda Rimes. Your writing style feels like it could translate into the world of screenplays. Enjoy your time abroad❤️
I start planning my packing weeks in advance. It’s absurd/embarrassing the amount of time I spend planning outfits and organizing packing cubes. I get anxious about choosing correctly and anticipating needs. It’s like I’m solving a riddle- who will I be on this trip? The answer is me. I should just pack what I’d normally wear. Basically two athleisure outfits. I still end up packing clothes that will come home unworn 🤷🏻♀️ 🙃 I did stop packing three books and that has helped lighten the load. Goddess bless us. 🧳 ✈️
god I love this so much because it kind of shows you that even if we're the thing we think we're supposed to be (which in my case, is you) it's still hard. I never, ever wear 70% of what I bring. Bless us so much
The plight of trying to be an authentic yet ever-evolving writer. Our work is only actually *us* for a moment. That’s why I love substack so much... write it, send and onto the next!
I’m pretty sure your writing helps people feel less alone, and that is a wonderful thing.
Graham, it makes me feel less alone reading notes like this, and I thank you greatly for that.
❤️❤️👍
Welcome to England Holly!
Isn’t how we travel like a miniature version of how we go through life, messy in spite of all our careful planning? I highly recommend Luscombe Wild Elderflower bubbly while you are here🥂
A good activity for a rainy day is a visit to the utterly whacky Royal Pavilion. (over the top 19th century chinoiserie.) If you have transport you could also visit Charleston the home of Virginia Wolf and Venessa Bell et.al. That is also fabulously over decorated but in a completely original way. Love 💕 them both.
I’ve just read the Hip Sobriety article you wrote back in July 2015 long before I knew you or it existed. ‘The real consequence of how we view addiction’ That was such a fantastic leap of understanding on your part especially at that time when no one else was even suggesting anything alternative. There is a yawning gulf between getting it 99 % and getting it 100% is there not? It’s as clear as a bell now, after a year and a bit of only getting it 99%. That article sums it up. No wonder it’s so hard when an entire culture and your whole family have swallowed the lie wholesale! It killed one, nearly did for the second, has fooled the one left alive and nearly destroyed me, but I’ve ( only just) seen it for the emperor with no clothes on that it is ( but with a revolver in its hand ).
Happy birthday for the 14th 🎂💐
I spent a week in Hawaii not doing anything but trying to write that piece. It was SO HARD and I deeply, deeply appreciate it that one person read it in 2023. The Pavillion was bananas. Fucking bananas.
Aint it just!?!
Hi Holly, thank you for this piece, it really found me at the right time! I am on a trip through my (our) beloved Sicily, on a bus to Taormina, crying like a fool because today it is my birthday, I am 40 years old, I am sober and clean and I am ALIVE.
I booked this trip on a whim and packed frilly dresses and bikinis but no hats, as if I hadn't been here before, as if I did not know that the sun here can boil your brain into a soup.
I have been travelling on my own for 10+ years and, especially since I got sober, I have more and more let go of the things I MUST do, see, eat. I follow my nose, my intuition, my gut. I don't travel anymore to find the things I think I want, or I am supposed to want, I travel so that what is "for me" can find me. And it always finds me. Last year this time I was on a deserted Sicilian island (Favignana), bored by the strong winds and crushed by my relentless self pity for booking the wrong island at the wrong time of the year. I packed a book with me, so I took it out of the suitcase to pass the time. That book was Pema's "When things fall apart". It hit me like a truck and it did because I was on the wrong island at the wrong time of the year.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts with us, it is always a pleasure to read you.
Stay messy and enjoy Sicily!
Elena! Wait where are you where the sun is boiling you because I'm freezing in Taormina. I love this so much. I feel it. And happy birthday to you.
Hey! I'm in Catania now and can confirm the strong midday sun 🤣. If you want to boil yr brain in Taormina, I suggest you go down to Isola Bella, it was pretty hot the other day. Also full of nasty pink jellifish so dip your toes carefully!
I spend as much time as I can in Brighton & Hove, in fact I’m heading to Hove on Wednesday for 5 days, my best friend lives there and I visit whenever I can. I ALWAYS take the “wrong” clothes and end up borrowing, costs, scarves etc. I have no excuse as I’m coming from Ireland with similar weather! Your piece illuminates that I pack for “holiday me” not actual me, the fictional version that has a whole vision of who she’ll magically turn in to when she step off the plane but she never turns up, there’s just me. So if you see someone as badly dressed as yourself in the coffee shops of Hove do say hi!! X
yes! holiday me, not actual me!
I love every bit of this. Thank you for sharing it.
<3
Dogs are dogs everywhere and it's beautiful.
I lived in Brussels for 8 years, and my near- daily walk to the supermarket brought me right through the city center, always packed with tourists and visitors from around the globe. Tour groups following guides with umbrellas, families, couples with cameras, British stag parties in costumes, all the time. And there were plenty of American tourists dressed how you describe, with weather-appropriate outerwear and new walking shoes. From time to time I would feel jealous that they were experiencing this city in such a leisurely way, in restaurants and through beer tastings before going back to a comfy hotel bed, when I knew the *real* Brussels because I had to live and struggle and survive there (obviously ignoring my own privilege in those envious moments, but the contrasts I saw had truth). But I think what you describe as a "messy" traveler by your/ our/American standards is closer to the normal traveler that I met a hundred times over and that I was when I lived in Europe. Traveling is uncomfortable and we must remain alert in a new situation, which means we're experiencing the world and its people with wide open eyes. To try to package away that discomfort, to keep everything about you the same (as in, closed) when you're somewhere new, is so totally missing the point. Which is to say, I could always pick out the American tourists, and they were never obnoxious like the stereotypes, but when I was thinking clearly, I felt so grateful that none of those constraints applied to me, and I could safely sit on an old church bench with my groceries in hand whenever I wanted and absorb the glory of my surroundings without having to answer to anyone.
Tl;dr: You're doing traveling right
Yes. Agree. Messy is good travel.
Heather thank you for this, that is such a wonderful perspective because you're absolutely right--the imagined ideal (I have) is sanitized and robotic and auto-pilot and maximized. And the reason I do it is to float and see and, as you say, experience the world with eyes wide open, which is exactly what it's been like. "Traveling is uncomfortable and we must remain alert in a new situation." That is so, so good, especially when you translate it to other things. Thanks for this.
This essay was perfection to me. I loved it more than anything else I've ever read by you (no offense to past you or to future you, but lots of kudos to present you). The way you use travel to illustrate the slow process of self acceptance and self love was gorgeously, masterfully done. And it is the reason I am now a paid subscriber.
I hated it so much by the time I finished it lol. Thank you so much for this note. Loving you.
What a great read Holly. Welcome to the UK and happy travelling. If you’re still in Hove go to Rockwater for great views and food. Hopefully the weather will be kind to you but if nothing else it’ll blow the mental cobwebs away. 😊
I got the total Hove and Brighton tour!
Fantastic. 🙌
I love when your post shows up in my inbox. Always makes me smile in part because I know something somewhere in what you’ve written will make me laugh, and this one did as well. Making someone laugh is such an incredible gift and a kindness. I appreciate how hard you work to get your writing to be the best it can be.
I also love your coat and your scarf. Sorry, I just do. BTW, I also feel like I’m my best self when traveling. And I like being in airports, on planes, in train stations, in nice hotel rooms, I like breakfast buffets. I spent several days in Cefalu last fall, in a little apartment on a narrow old Sicilian side street, and I loved walking a few blocks every morning to a small piazza, through streams of kids heading to school, and having coffee and pastries in the little square, and just watching life go by. I adored it. Or having lunch and early dinner in the Vucaria (sp?) in Palermo, just some simple pasta and an espresso, in a little place off the main alley, and just hanging out.
I got bad advice on getting from Rome to Palermo and then to Cefalu. The plane was three hours late, so I missed the right train connection, which instead of taking one hour from the airport, was going to be two. I threw caution to the winds and negotiated a taxi from Palermo to Cefalu, which cost a fortune and pissed off the driver. Because he underestimated the length of the trip he drove a like a wild man and refused to take me to the door of my apartment, dropped me off nearby sort of.
But I got there at a reasonable hour and walked to a lively outdoor seaside restaurant and had just gotten my meal when a huge bird took a giant shit on my head. I raced to the nearest bathroom where they misunderstood me and told me to dry my hair under the blow dryer. When I yelled bird shit a few times (universal translation ) they got it and whipped into action, with soap, water and tons of paper towels. I finished my adequate meal with great views and walked back to my little apartment where I had reserved a 3 rd floor room not realizing that in Italy and many places that’s really the fourth floor, and basically like climbing Macchu Pichu, so I dragged my enormous suitcase up a thousand steps with the help of the landlady who was about 5 feet tall and stronger than me (which is not saying much). I fell into bed, exhausted, trying to drown out the roar of many motorbikes roaring up and down the street.
HOWEVER, I awoke to a beautiful sunrise over the Mediterranean as I walked out in the rooftop patio that came with my Macchu Picchu apartment, and then strolled down to the piazzo where the nearby bakery brought coffee and pastries to my little table on the square.
SO, all that craziness and to some degree poor planing and lack of due diligence on my part rewarded me with some great stories and memories and isn’t that what travel should be about: the situations you have to roll with, the characters you meet, the surprises- oh, how I love the surprises, at some point perhaps I can tell you about my wild Irish/English/Ukrainian singalong in a hotel lobby in Rome last May. And so poignant given the Ukraine situation at that time (and still.). The scenery, the food, sometimes, but especially the stories and the memories. Like the one you described.
I digress. Thank you for making me laugh today.
oh I love this Joe! I also love planes and trains and hotel rooms and bad buffets, and that walk in the morning down some italian street to get your coffee and pastry is the best part. I just did that. One time I took the train from Messina to Naples and you know you have to get on the ferry, and I had only two pairs of socks or something and my feet were really stinky and some guy ran into my coach and threw socks at me. Clean socks my size. lol.
Congratulations tomorrow on your ten years. What an achievement
That’s hysterical. The right size. It’s almost like he went shopping ahead of time.
I had a recent tour guide, in India, who said:” Bad roads ( and long ones) lead to great places.” I would add lead to great stories and memories as well.
Reading your posts- it’s like hearing from an old friend. Straight talk. It makes me cry. It makes me smile. Safe travels.
I love that Pat. Thank you.
I've been brain toggling about whether to take a few days off of teaching and actually go somewhere. Like, get on a plane, and not plan it, and just do it. I've spent too many days worrying about the mess, and not buying the ticket. This piece felt like a mirror to my thoughts; why am I consumed with "seeing and doing the thing"? Eating the right thing in the right place? The single female solo travel. I felt very empowered by the way this piece was written. It's again this idea of the subtle aggression against who we are...if I don't want to perfectly plan it, if that isn't coming naturally to me (so much as to create a deterrent me from even going), why am I wasting so much time? Buying a roundtrip mess ticket.
I mean that’s one of the ‘upsides’ of how I am, I don’t think, I just go. And I don’t think I’ve ever regretted just going. I hope you have so much fun.
BTW On Photography by Sontag is worth reading if you haven’t yet ! Even better than the podcast
Noted. I have it; it’s in the pile with every other book our friend Stephen recommends. I’ll move it up.
So fucking good, thank you.
<3 Jenevieve
I loved reading this. Travel is so magical and messy in its own right. It makes me notice all the ways I’m on autopilot in my own life because there is no routine and no absolutes, from coffee to bathrooms, to weather, to smells, its 100% groundlessness. A daily experiment, so many surprises. Also, i think Bob Seger may have actually meant to sing “Working on my night cheese”. ❤️
Yes yes yes, to all of this. Thank you. Also: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xn4QyOoaOIo
Omg- I thought *for sure* that was a Holly Original. Hilarious that Seger covered a Liz Lemon hit. Good for him. Also: Have you considered getting into tv writing? I think you would slay working with someone awesome like Shonda Rimes. Your writing style feels like it could translate into the world of screenplays. Enjoy your time abroad❤️
lol yes all the greats took from Liz. I completely believe I would ruin tv if i wrote it. <3
Hehe- I’d watch :)
Yes 🙌
I start planning my packing weeks in advance. It’s absurd/embarrassing the amount of time I spend planning outfits and organizing packing cubes. I get anxious about choosing correctly and anticipating needs. It’s like I’m solving a riddle- who will I be on this trip? The answer is me. I should just pack what I’d normally wear. Basically two athleisure outfits. I still end up packing clothes that will come home unworn 🤷🏻♀️ 🙃 I did stop packing three books and that has helped lighten the load. Goddess bless us. 🧳 ✈️
god I love this so much because it kind of shows you that even if we're the thing we think we're supposed to be (which in my case, is you) it's still hard. I never, ever wear 70% of what I bring. Bless us so much
I do more like three hours in advance 😳
That sounds very reasonable 🙌
Worth the wait. 💕
You know I hated it by the time I sent it last night. Thanks Jen. xx
The plight of trying to be an authentic yet ever-evolving writer. Our work is only actually *us* for a moment. That’s why I love substack so much... write it, send and onto the next!