Since moving to New York in 2018 I’ve tried to go visit my family in California three to four times a year. I was planning to come visit in August but at some point I was talking to Jake and we decided to change my trip to California to a brothers trip. We looked at a few ideas but the one that we quickly landed on was Iceland a place Jake has talked about wanting to go to for a long, long time. So even with the pandemic we booked it and on August 11th we began our journey to Reykjavik, Iceland.

As I write this, I’m currently flying over the United States on my way to Iceland and then to Paris. It was only a day ago I woke up, went for my normal morning run, and came back to have my entire world flipped upside down. I had a late meeting so Jenn in her not to casual, yet forceful way, offered me a cup of coffee. Who am I to refuse the leader of our household? As she walked my morning coffee over to me she had an odd look on her face and I noticed she was also holding her phone unconventionally. She walked up with a mug we had purchased at a Starbucks in Paris. She exclaimed like only Jenn can, “you see the city on the mug, we’re going there tomorrow to celebrate your 30th birthday!”