Longest Trip Away From Home

In the last three years I have been on the road so much...175,000 miles to be exact. I have traveled all over the US and Canada with a few trips to Mexico here and there. But I've never been as far as I am about to go and well, to sum it up, I'm pretty nervous.

Shayna is getting married in Turin, Italy and when she announced it I knew that that is where I wanted to use Richie's Skymiles. I booked the trip without really looking back. I was ready. I've spent the last month planning and asking others to go with me and Kaki is going to now meet me in Rome.

Most of the time when I have a vacation planned I research it and I plan and plan, but not this one. I haven't let myself look at one internet site or read one book. In fact, I haven't really wanted to. The last few weeks I have talked about it a lot and listened as others have given me advice on what to do and where to go but I haven't let myself really believe I am going.

I think its because I am so scared to be so far from home. What if something happens to someone and I am not here? Such a simple fear that is not unrealistic but I guess after losing Richie my fear is a little more powerful. I have felt anxious and sick to my stomach today thinking about it. I am really going far away from everything I am familiar with. In the last year and 1/2 all I have bounced from wanting to be around the familiar to wanting to be around the unknown so I can disappear into the crowds and not be, "Stacie the Widow."

Come Monday I fly to Boston and have meetings then Summer will meet me there and she and I will board the plane and head out Wednesday night for Turin. Then I'll take a train from there on Monday to meet Kaki in Rome. We'll spend a few days there then head to a night in Paris before we fly home. I know I am ready and I know this is something I truly want to do but I'm nervous...I want to enjoy every single minute of it. I don't want my widowhood to be apart of this trip at all...I just want to be a little American girl traveling abroad with her friend and expereiencing a new adventure.

Richie, I hope you are up there watching me take this step and are proud of me...the old Stacie would have never done this without you. This would have been a trip I would have had to talk you into but I know you would have gone with me and I know you would have loved seeing it all with me. I miss you and think of you all the time...I hate that I am living this life and you were not given that chance. I miss you Richie...so much...