Tia Mckinney

Columnist

I recently visited Montgomery, AL, and was inspired while having dinner with

my parents. We stayed at the Renaissance downtown and it was magnificent. Beautiful floors,

clean rooms, and magnificent food!

While having dinner, I ordered one of my favorite appetizers –  fried green tomatoes. Yum! Although it was something I have all the time, these had toppings that I had never tried before. Some sort of cheese with a raspberry vinaigrette.

Then I had the thought, I hadn’t tried a new food in a while. Wow, something new!

My question to you is, “When was the last time you did something for the first time?” It can be easy to get caught up in our local surroundings when places, people, and roads look the same  every day, but that should not be the focus.

The focus should be to live our absolute best lives. Traveling is one of my absolute favorite pastimes. It’s always good to return home, it’s where you belong, but it never hurts to venture out even if just for a day.

Since I posed the question, I won’t hesitate to answer. When was the last time I

did something for the first time? This past July, I had the opportunity to visit a new continent when I went to Santiago, Chile, South America.

I imagined that it would have been extremely hot, but to my surprise it was their winter season. I thought I had lost a lot of mySpanish speaking skills, but to my surprise I was still able to hold  full conversations.

For the trip I became our group’s translator I ate the food, drank their

traditional drinks, saw the mountains, and attended a local holy burial.

My family jokes about putting a tracker on me because I could be anywhere, at any given time, in any part of the world. I love being able to pack my bags and go see the world.

I’m addicted to new experiences. They keep me inspired.

Although your something new doesn’t have to be travel, if it is, I strongly encourage you to book

a travel experience to anywhere in the world with Lexi Armstrong of LexVacation! She is a local

travel agent and can work with any budge! Tell her Tia sent you.

So again I ask you, “When was the last time you did something for the first time?”