Every time I try to start Broken Heels, I end up back in the same place.
Krakow.
It’s almost like muscle memory at this point. Open a blank page, start typing, and suddenly I’m back in a small city in Poland, writing about cheap flights and old streets and the version of me who first discovered that you could just… go somewhere.
Krakow is one of those cities that quietly changes you. Not in a dramatic, movie montage kind of way. More like a shift. A realisation. A little spark.
It’s where all the Ryanair flights used to go from Glasgow Prestwick. Or “Glasgow” Prestwick, which is hilarious when you actually know where it is. But back then, that didn’t matter. It was cheap, it was easy, and it felt like a door had opened.
And I walked straight through it.
That was the beginning for me. Not just travel blogging. Blogging in general. The idea that I could go somewhere, experience something, and then come home and write about it like it mattered.
Because it did matter. It still does.
But here’s the thing.
Every time I try to rebuild Broken Heels, I start with Krakow again. I write that one post. I pour all the nostalgia into it. I remember who I was back then. And then…
Nothing. Silence. The blog stalls before it’s even begun.
So maybe Krakow isn’t the beginning anymore.
Maybe it was the beginning once, and that’s enough.
Maybe Broken Heels doesn’t need to start where it always started before. Maybe it gets to start where I am now.
Still travelling. Still noticing things. Still romanticising airports and hotel rooms and the feeling of being somewhere that isn’t home.
Krakow can stay in the story. Of course it can. It’s part of the origin myth at this point.
But it doesn’t get to hold the whole blog hostage.
Not this time.
This time, we keep going.
