Vienna Gave Me Back My Sense of Wonder

I had dreamed about Vienna since I was eleven years old and my piano teacher played me a recording of the Vienna Philharmonic. Sachertorte. The Spanish Riding School. The Ringstrasse at night. I had it all filed away somewhere and had never quite got around to going.

Then my marriage ended. And I thought: I am fifty-seven years old and I have been putting things off my whole life. A friend sent me a link to Lily Valley Journeys. I booked within a week.

I was nervous at the airport. By the second day in Vienna, I couldn’t remember why. Our group — nine of us — had the kind of instant ease you only get when everyone has given themselves permission to simply be there. No pretending, no performance. Just women being curious together.

The Musikverein concert hall broke my heart in the best way. Standing there in that gilded room before the evening’s performance, I thought: why did I wait so long for this? For any of this?

The café culture in Vienna is its own kind of philosophy. We spent hours over Melange and Apfelstrudel, talking about everything and nothing. One afternoon stretched into evening without any of us noticing.

I booked my next trip — the Portugal journey — on the flight home. I had barely landed.