I just returned from teaching a weeklong writing workshop in the car-free town of Yelapa, Mexico with Deep Travel Workshops. While there, I noticed myself becoming increasingly attuned to sensory experiences. It started with the calls of seabirds in the early morning. It continued with the drizzle of tartar sauce on a fish taco, the crunch of seeds in a passionfruit margarita, and the sweetness of chilled avocado pie. Before sleep, it was the baritone rumble of waves in the Bay of Banderas. And later in the week, the smell of wild sage rubbed between my fingers on the hike to a waterfall.
It’s not surprising it started with the birds, since I’ve been a novice birder for a few years. But Yelapa turned me obsessive. From a beach chair inside my open-air casita, I spent hours bringing the birds closer to me through my binoculars. There were brown pelicans, egrets, ibis, stilts, willets, gulls, magnificent frigatebirds, and herons (tri-color, night, and great). And on the hike to the waterfall, a great kiskadee.
Walking barefoot on the beach one afternoon, I felt something brush against my hat and heard a flutter by my ear. I looked up to see a giant brown pelican swooping away from me.
A man was walking toward me. “Did you see that?” I asked him. “Did that just happen?”
He nodded. “It definitely got some height on you.”
When I told my students later, one said, “You got a pelican kiss!”
I often feel disconnected from nature when I’m home in New Orleans, as I spend my days teaching on Zoom and writing and editing on a computer. I tend to have my head down a lot. But in Yelapa, nature came to me. Its wings tapped me on the head and said, look up.
Now that I’m home, I’m trying to do more of that.
I’m looking ahead, as well…
This May, I’ll be teaching in yet another magical setting: an agriturismo on the Ionian Seacoast, in Sicily. I’m working with two phenomenal women, Colette Hannahan and Michelle Titus. I’ll lead writing classes, Colette will lead painting and meditation, and Michelle will lead movement (yoga, Qi gong) and meditation. A few spaces are still available.
I’m also offering two workshops this summer: an online class on writing the Modern Love essay through Off Assignment’s Masters Series courses (Wednesday afternoons in July), and a morning workshop called “Writing the World” with my dear friend, Marcia DeSanctis, at the annual Book Passage Travel Writers and Photographers Conference.
Meanwhile, Studio Unfurl, the online creative community I started with my dear friends Colette and Karen is well underway, with interwoven art and writing classes, guest chats, prompt studios, mentorship, and more. A waitlist is open for our second semester.
And my friend Kelly and I have been hard at work producing season three of our travel storytelling podcast, There She Goes! We have some stunning essays coming out soon.
As for publications, a huge career highlight for me has been editing The Best Women’s Travel Writing. I’ve edited the last six collections, and I’m so pleased that Travelers’ Tales has asked to edit Volume 13, as well. It will be published in 2025, and I’m accepting submissions now. You can send your true travel essays here. (There’s no deadline yet, but I’ll post submission guidelines on social media and my website soon.)
I was also delighted to have a micro-essay published last month in one of my favorite literary journals, River Teeth.
And I have another (very) personal essay coming out (very) soon, online and in print. It’s a story I’ve been sitting on for 30 years, and I couldn’t be happier that it’s found a (very) good home: the “Modern Love” column in The New York Times! I’m still pinching myself to have a second Modern Love essay accepted.
I think that’s all for now.
I’m flying off again in a few hours, for spring break with my husband and son. I’m packing my binoculars, of course. I’ll keep looking up. I hope you will, too.
Lavinia
