What I Learned from Living Out of a Suitcase for 4 Months

Consider reality. Not too many people get to say goodbye to their everyday lives and take a four-month vacation to a sunny, seasonless wonderland. But in August, my husband Sam and I headed from our home base in Philadelphia out to the Bay Area to do exactly that. Well, almost. Sam works in academia, and he was spending the fall semester on sabbatical at the University of California, Berkeley. I'd still be working as a freelance writer, but it was a chance to do something totally different and e...