They say we are a product of those who came before us and are around us. My roots run deep in the Midwest of the USA and I am now growing new ones as an expat in Amstelveen, Netherlands.  All the experiences and people that I have known that brought me here have made me who I am. I am a proud father of two boys and one dog, and husband to a woman who is the most patient and loving mom and wife I could ever have hoped for. She is my travel partner, my life coach and my tag-team sidekick in the ever interesting match of child raising.

What originally started as a forum for ideas of politics, religion and all things controversial has since become much more (or less?). In April of 2016, I decided the disparity between the original intent of the blog and what it currently was had grown too great, and changed the title from the rambling and controversy evoking What You Can’t Talk About at the Dinner Table to the sufficiently brief and vague title of Vida Colorado.

The origins of the blog were no doubt rooted in the fact that I just love to write, which hasn’t changed. Vida Colorado now brings in a few new dimensions, including my photo blog, Westward, and some nifty interactive data visualizations.

A study of blogs from 2013 (which consequently didn’t reveal its methodology, but I’ll just roll with it) estimates the number of blogs on the internet to be around 152 million, with millions of new posts being written each day. So why should you read mine?

Well, I’ll fully admit: I am going to try to sell you something. I’ll try to sell you on my perspective; on the notion that being a globally rooted person teaches you things that can’t be learned elsewhere. I’ll try to sell you on the belief that life is often not black and white, and how it can sometimes be poisonous to think it so. So if you care to hear my pitch…. go ahead and sign up for my email list and keep an eye on what goes on here. And if not, I guess this will just be another one of the 152+ million that you don’t read.