Reflections Along the Journey
Life has a way of teaching us through the people we meet, the places we explore, and the experiences we never expected. Here I share the reflections, lessons, and discoveries that have become the touchstones and turning points of my own journey.
Every Place has a Story
Some stories are found in the towns where we grew up. Others are hidden in historic homes, quiet museums, weathered monuments, or places we pass every day without a second thought. Join me as we uncover the people, events, and moments that have shaped our communities and discover the stories waiting to be found all around us.
Hometown Stories
There is something grounding about knowing the place you call home: its landmarks, quiet corners, familiar roads, and the stories layered beneath everyday life. Whether we grew up there or found our way there later, towns shape our understanding of community. They provide a sense of continuity and belonging that often remains with us long after we leave. My Hometown Stories began with the places most closely connected to my own life and family. As the collection has grown, however, so has my understanding of what a hometown can be. It is not only where we were born or where we currently live. It can also be a community we return to over the years or a place we discover while traveling that invites us to slow down and learn more. When visiting a new community, I enjoy leaving the main road to explore its town center, historic neighborhoods, public buildings, churches, cemeteries, museums, and preserved landscapes. Courthouse squares, old mills, general stores, monuments, plaques, and small historical markers often reveal stories that would otherwise remain unnoticed. They show us not only what happened in a town, but also what its residents value and how they have chosen to remember their past. These stories are my way of looking more closely at the communities we visit and sharing what I discover. Each one begins with a place, but ultimately becomes a story about people; those who established the community, those who sustained it, and those who continue deciding what will be preserved and carried forward.
History Around Us
I have been drawn to the quiet reminders of the past: the statues, monuments, plaques, weathered stones, and unexpected objects that preserve the memory of people and events. All my life, I have stopped to look at them, read their inscriptions, and wonder why they were placed there and whose story they were meant to tell. These reminders can be found almost anywhere: beside a courthouse, in a town common, along a roadside, inside a public building, or tucked into a corner that most people pass without noticing. Some commemorate events that changed a nation, while others remember a local resident, a vanished industry, an earlier building, or an ordinary moment in community life. Each one raises questions. Who decided this person or event should be remembered? Why was this particular place chosen? What did the monument mean to the generation that created it, and does it carry the same meaning today? Sometimes the story is clearly explained. At other times, a few words on a plaque become the beginning of a much larger search. History is all around us, woven into the places we travel and the communities we call home. Here, I share some of the markers, memorials, objects, and surviving traces that have caught my eye and encouraged me to stop, look more closely, and discover the stories they hold.
Homes With Stories
Some homes stay with me, not because of their size or architectural importance, but because of the lives once lived within their walls. I am fascinated by the way a room, a staircase, or an ordinary household object can reveal how people worked, gathered, celebrated, struggled, and cared for one another in another time. From a young age, I visited historic houses and learned how to move carefully through them. How to look without touching and to listen as guides explained how people once lived. Those early visits taught me that a house could tell a story through its furnishings, architecture, worn floors, family possessions, and even the changes made by later generations. They created a lifelong love of visiting historic homes. When I homeschooled my children, these houses became part of their education as well. We traveled great distances to visit the homes of people we had studied, walking through the rooms where they had lived and seeing the surroundings that helped shape their lives. History became more tangible when we could stand in the places where decisions were made, books were written, families were raised, and everyday life unfolded. I often think about the millions of people who have lived before us and the relatively small number of homes that have been preserved. Why were these particular houses saved, and whose stories do they tell? What can they teach us about the owners, families, workers, servants, and communities connected to them? Here, I share some of the homes I have visited and the stories that remain within their walls.
Curated History
Some of history’s greatest stories are preserved not in the places where they happened, but in the museums, archives, libraries, historical societies, and private collections that have carefully safeguarded them. Within these collections, objects removed from their original surroundings continue to carry the memories of the people who created, owned, or used them. I am grateful for the people who recognize the importance of these objects and dedicate themselves to preserving them. Curators, archivists, historians, collectors, volunteers, and donors make it possible for fragile documents, everyday possessions, works of art, and irreplaceable artifacts to survive. Their work allows each generation to encounter evidence of lives and events it could not otherwise experience. In Curated History, we explore the large, the small, and everything in between. A major museum may hold objects recognized around the world, while a small local collection may preserve the only remaining evidence of a community, family, business, or tradition. An object does not need to be grand or valuable to tell an important story. Sometimes the simplest item offers the most direct connection to the past. Here, I share the collections I have explored, the artifacts that captured my attention, and the stories they continue to tell. Each visit offers another opportunity to look closely and connect with the people, events, ideas, and everyday experiences that have shaped our world.
Meet Nan
As I move through my seventh decade of life, I have come to appreciate that our lives are shaped by touchstones and turning points. Some are people. Some are places. Some are moments we recognize immediately, while others reveal their significance only with time.
My journey has taken me from the small towns of New England to national parks across America, from the cobblestone streets of Europe to historic sites around the world. Along the way, I have discovered that every place has a story waiting to be uncovered. Whether standing in a presidential home, walking a Civil War battlefield, exploring a quiet museum, or reading a bundle of family letters, I have found that history is not simply about the past, it helps us better understand ourselves and the paths that brought us here.
For more than four decades, I have also been privileged to serve as a chiropractor, teacher, and mentor. While I am grateful for the professional accomplishments, I have learned that the greatest rewards are found in the relationships built with patients, students, colleagues, friends, and family. Those connections have become some of the most meaningful touchstones in my own life.
This website is a collection of those discoveries. It is where history, travel, family, and personal reflection come together. Through these stories, I hope to encourage others to develop curiosity, look a little closer, and discover the remarkable people, places, and moments that surround them.
Because I’ve come to believe that every place has a story… and every life is shaped by the touchstones and turning points we choose to remember.
Along the Journey
Travel has never been about collecting destinations. It's about discovering the people, places, and moments that stay with us long after we've returned home. Through America's national parks, journeys around the world, and the messages left behind by earlier generations, I've found that every journey has the potential to become a touchstone and every discovery can become a turning point.
Our National Parks
I did not discover our national parks until I was in my thirties. While exploring with my daughters, I visited Minute Man National Historical Park in Massachusetts and learned that it was part of something much larger—the National Park System. I was fascinated by the idea that places considered important to our shared history and natural heritage had been entrusted to the nation and preserved for everyone. Until then, I had thought of national parks primarily as vast landscapes of mountains, forests, and canyons. I soon discovered that the system also protects battlefields, historic homes, monuments, seashores, archaeological sites, and places where important chapters of the American story unfolded. Each one offers a different way to understand the land and the people who came before us. That first discovery began a journey that has continued for decades. I have now visited more than 400 places within the National Park System, returning to some more than once. I have traveled from towering mountains and winding coastlines to quiet historic sites, always finding something new to learn, appreciate, or remember. Our national parks preserve extraordinary places, but they also belong to all of us. Each visit is an opportunity to step into history, experience the present, and reflect on what we have chosen to protect for the future. Here, I share the places I have explored and the discoveries, stories, and simple moments of wonder I found along the way.
Exploring the World
For the first seventeen years of my life, the only states I had visited were New Hampshire and Maine. My world felt small and familiar, and I never imagined that one day I would travel far beyond those early boundaries to explore so many different parts of the world. International travel has since become one of the great teachers of my life. Walking through ancient streets, standing before monuments, entering places of worship, and experiencing landscapes unlike those at home have brought history and culture to life in ways that books alone never could. Each destination has helped me understand how geography, faith, tradition, conflict, and community shape the lives of people. Travel has also given me opportunities to encounter different cultures through their food, architecture, art, music, celebrations, and ordinary routines. Some of the most meaningful moments have come not from famous landmarks, but from observing daily life and recognizing both the differences that make each culture distinctive and the experiences we all share. The opportunity to see so much of the world has enriched my life in more ways than I could ever have imagined. Each journey has left me with new stories, broader perspectives, and a deeper appreciation for the beauty, diversity, and resilience found across our globe. Here, I share some of the places that expanded my world and changed the way I understand it.
Messages From the Past
A Window Into Everyday Life on the American Home Front, These correspondences preserved from World War II, offer a rare, unfiltered look into what it meant to live through World War II as an American civilian. These letters, written by my parents and grandmother, caught in an extraordinary moment in time, capture the realities of a nation mobilized for war: rationing, restricted travel, overcrowded railways, financial strain, and the emotional weight carried by families waiting for news from their loved ones. In these pages we see how mothers worried about their sons, wives longed to be with their husbands, and how soldiers coped with situations that pushed them to their limits. We also glimpse the infrastructure of wartime America, hospital trains transporting the wounded, shifting railroad schedules as troop movement took priority, and the everyday acceptance of sacrifice as a civic duty. Beyond the headlines, these letters tell the story of how war shaped daily existence: the uncertainty of when loved ones would return, the struggle to balance hope with hardship, and the quiet resilience found in kitchens, train stations, and small towns across the country. Together, they illuminate a world in which ordinary Americans live with constant shortages, ever-changing rules, and the unspoken expectation to endure.
All in The Head
It’s All in the Head is more than a book, it reflects over four decades of experience as both a parent and a healthcare provider. Co-authored with my husband, Dr. Martin Rosen, this work brings together the lessons, insights, and clinical understanding we’ve gathered while caring for our own children and for families in practice.
At the heart of this message is a simple but powerful idea: many things we are told are “common” in children are not always truly “normal.” When we begin to look more closely, we can better understand what our children are telling us through their development, behavior, and health.
This book was created to guide parents through those early, formative years with greater clarity and confidence, offering practical insight, meaningful perspective, and the reassurance that you can trust your observations and instincts.
My hope is that it empowers you to ask better questions, recognize early patterns, and make informed choices that support your child’s growth, development, and long-term well-being.
Coming Soon
The Four Houses
