  Sunday morning we awoke starving with absolutely no food in the house. It's not like I needed those excuses, though, so we happily loaded the family and headed to Croissant Brioche. We're in a terrible restaurant rut. We frequent about ten restaurants in the inner loop, and rarely break out for a new one. To understand what a tragedy this is, you have to know that Houston has more restaurants per capita than New York, and most of them aren't chains, they're original and individually owned, and typically have very good food.
There's a reason Houston's the fattest city! But I digress... Ellie and I sat down, John and Aidan went off to order. A man sitting alone next to us smiled at Ellie and I made a casual comment about everyone loving babies. He said he had six kids! We got to talking and he said he was about to move his family to Guatemala. He is an ultralight instructor and does a lot of flight aid with Americares. He fell in love with Guatemala and he wants to go there and help people build houses, and give tourists ultralight flights to get by. I was in love with the picture he painted, and my brain really hung on what he said about building houses. I told him we have done some work with aid organizations that work to enhance technology transfer for developing countries and we're hoping to begin working with Earthships soon. He was pretty excited and said we just had to go see him in Guatemala and we would surely set up a housebuilding program there.
We exchanged contact info and he went on his way. As we drove home, I was musing about the rhythm of our lives and the amazing connection we just made. It was like we were our own little hyperlink in the giant code script of life for that one moment. This happened similarly when we visited Chaco Canyon. I was sitting at the edge of the Kiva in the Big Room and the man next to me began talking to me. He was a solar engineer who lived in Wisconsin off grid, and made a living of helping others go off grid as well. This seed became our reservation to rent the Earthship in September, and the rest is history! Along the way home I noticed this pretty little shop called Tribal Hut had a going out of business sign and I asked John to stop so I could run in.
As I browsed, the very friendly owner and I chatted. I asked if he was moving locations or closing forever. He said he just couldn't afford Montrose anymore and his own credit is shot from trying. He's going to take a trip for a few months and when he gets back he'll reevaluate and decide the answer to that. I think some part of me already knew the answer to the question, but I had to ask. Where are you going for your trip? Guatemala! 
