Here are some fragments—images, words, moments—from wandering the Açores with my kids and a circle of wide-awake, brilliant, unruly souls who somehow feel like the pieces I’ve been missing. We’re all chasing the same thing: the real reason we’re here, what we came to learn, what we refuse to repeat. My children dragged me into this chapter without even knowing it, and I thank God for it.

I don’t know where this post will land or who it’s meant for. Maybe it’s meant for you. Maybe it’s meant for the version of me who kept quiet for far too long. But after this tour… something in me shifted. Not a soft, fleeting shift—no. Something tectonic. I’ve watched my kids come back from their own journeys cracked open in the best way, more themselves than before. Now I finally understand. All of it. And I’m grateful—painfully, breathlessly—for every single moment, the light ones and the dark ones that tore me open.

It will take time to digest what these weeks did to me. I felt everything. Every extreme a human heart can register—hurt, awe, confusion, love, and tenderness—rushing through me in a three-week storm. This wasn’t just a tour; it was an initiation. I came home carrying so much, yet almost none of it was physical. Mostly I returned with a sharper awareness: that what we do ripples into other people’s lives, deep and wide. That God is not only real but the most loving, the most merciful power of all. That the world contains far too much cruelty. And that I know nothing—nothing—but I’m starving to know what the past is trying to shout at us, what God is nudging us toward, what purpose keeps tugging at our sleeves.

I hope—I caught the pulse of this place. The archipelago felt like another planet entirely. A mystical one. Look closely at these images. Look past the obvious. There’s always something hiding in plain sight. I hope you feel some piece of my mind’s eye, the strange vision I carried through these islands. I didn’t capture everything I wanted; half the time I was wrestling my own demons, half surrendering to the present, half discovering things about myself I never asked to know. I had no map for what would unfold. I just showed up, shook off what I could, and let the rest come at me. It was… a lot, but it was wonderful.

So if you sit with these photos, maybe let them stir something in you. This place, this tour—my son and his team of wild, magical creatures built it from scratch. A dream turned real. A test of faith, courage, softness. I am honored and grateful to those who took the adventure and the risk. And as a mother who would trade her life a thousand times over for her children, watching them birth something this powerful is its own kind of holy. Parents are here to see their children—really see them—and honor who they are becoming. To love what they love. To cheer for what lights them up.

These photos hit hardest on a real screen—computer or iPad. And for what it’s worth, I worked through them while listening to the Oracle Sisters, Divinations, ancient Genesis tracks like Dance On A Volcano, Pink Floyd, Any Color You Like, Frank Zappa, Cosmik Debris, Here Comes The Flood, Peter Gabriel, Wonderous Stories, Yes and and all sorts strange sonic rabbit holes the algorithm threw at me.

The best part was meeting the people. Everyone is a badass in their own way and I appreciate every. single. one of them. Oh, and all the rainbows.

Cheers,

Laura

Atlantis Lives

Transformed by time/ yet held in our hearts/

The truth we seek to be revealed by those who

Travelled before our time/ with hope preserved

In tomes unread/the ancient ones did tell of precious

Dreams and values deemed a right for all that passed

this way/shall once more see what poets knew to be

held fast in living truths/the strong shall share with

those most meek/ to build a life we all hold true and

seek the path as told before/pray not repeat the

wayward way that doomed before our planet

slept/fatigued by rules that vaulted greed above

the souls of you and me….

James Marshall Goff

Searching for Atlantis

Searching for the Lost City of Atlantis

The depths of the seas near the stinging mantis

Down, down in the caverns of the oceans

There is a city uncharted that’s in shear e motion

A place where people know not of hate

But of eminent, trustworthiness of a live fate

Posidon”s people and fish live together

They’ve learned in peace the way now, forever

The peace they possess imminently within

Shows others not to, in them, cause lethal sin

The sins of nature will destroy you

And everyone around and near to you, too

Atlantis is near

So do not fear

Atlantis is in your heart

If you want its dear part.

Travis “Ceijaeh” Klein

“But afterwards there occurred violent earthquakes and floods; and in a single day and night of misfortune all your warlike men in a body sank into the earth, and the island of Atlantis in like manner disappeared in the depths of the sea.”



― Plato, Timaeus and Critias