As we are headed on this journey, you should probably know a bit about me. Travel is in my blood. My parents have both traveled the globe…in fact they met on a plane and reconnected via the busiest airport in the world. Due to my dad’s job, I was born in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia and visited half a dozen countries before moving to California, where I grew up. It is also the place we will always be a complete family, as my mom died there when I was 11. My dad, brother, and I moved to South Carolina when I was in high school and, after a stint back in California, I attended college. When I accepted a spot to earn my master’s at Villanova University, I did not know then how important Philadelphia would be in my life. I immediately felt like it was home, something I had never truly felt. Following graduation, I moved back home, took what I thought would be my dream job, and, when that fell apart, decided I was done pressing pause and was going to live where I wanted…Philadelphia. So I packed my car, stayed on my best friends’ couch for a couple weeks, and started to come back into myself. I have built a life, I am an adjunct professor and work at a non-profit. I have the most remarkable group of friends-I would be lost without them. 

But the most important people are my dad and my little (well, he’ 6’2 and in his 30s but still). They are my north star.

-Kelly