Dena Moes is a Hollywood-born, Yale-educated nurse-midwife with a BA in literature. Dena has been a practicing midwife for eighteen years but leaves town each summer for family travel. Her family attends Rainbow Gatherings and Burning Man, and tours the West Coast festival circuit as the Moes Family Band. They always come home in time for school to start—except in 2014, when they went to India for a year. Moes is a songwriter whose work is showcased by the Moes Family Band. She has had articles and essays published in Midwifery Today, Shasta Parent, and Minerva Rising. Her work is in Demeter Press’s anthology Travellin’ Mama. She is currently gestating her next book, Rebel Midwife. More information can be found at www.denamoes.com.

Dena was a stressed-out midwife longing to escape the hamster wheel of modern motherhood. Adam was an eccentric Buddhist yogi disguised as a hard-working Dad. Bella was fourteen and wanted to be normal. Sophia was up for anything that involved missing school. Together, they shouldered backpacks and walked away from their California home, to criss-cross India and Nepal for a year.

The family left behind a life of carpools, macaroni and cheese, and Cal Skate for rickshaw rides, thali plates, and grand pujas in Buddhist monasteries. Their quest for new perspectives led them to his Holiness the Dalai Lama, the tree where the Buddha sat, and into the arms of Amma the Divine Mother. From the banks of the Ganges to the Himalayan roof of the world, the family experienced auspicious coincidences, colorful adventures, countless plates of rice and dal, and some serious challenges—and ultimately came home with a new understanding of love.