Sylvie Belmond, a longtime Ventura County journalist with strong ties to Simi Valley, shares her personal story of risk, change, and resilience. Her journey spans continents, careers, and communities — and reminds us that the path forward often starts with one simple decision: to keep moving.
(CLAIR | Simi Valley, CA) — Every life is a collection of turning points. Some arrive quietly, disguised as chance encounters. Others call out with undeniable urgency. My story—like yours, perhaps—is a long thread of answered calls, steps into the unknown, and the quiet trust that the next chapter would reveal itself when I moved toward it.
It all began in a small Swiss village, where life was supposed to follow a clear path: school, apprenticeship, career. By sixteen, most of my classmates knew what was next. I wasn’t so sure.
I worked my first job in a pharmaceutical lab, the same one where my father had worked decades earlier. I saved my earnings from restaurant jobs too, feeling that tug toward something larger—something I couldn’t yet name. Geneva was my first leap. Among the children of American diplomats, I struggled to understand their fast English at first, but I listened, learned, and adapted. That was my real education: learning by being in the world.
Soon I was traveling farther—hitchhiking to Amsterdam in winter, riding trains to Italy, crossing borders and meeting strangers who would shape my view of life. Not everything made sense at the time, but looking back, I can see it clearly now: each step mattered because I took it.
After trying trade school for a year, I realized conventional paths didn’t suit me. So I crossed an ocean instead.
California was my next classroom. I worked as an au pair, then moved onto a tugboat in Sausalito with a friend named Teza. Later, I stayed with a family in Tiburon, where I first touched a computer—a blinking green cursor in 1984 that felt like a small miracle. I didn’t know it then, but technology would quietly thread itself through my life.
I kept moving. Los Angeles. Mexico. Phoenix. New Orleans. Miami. I met people who invited me into their lives, if only for a night or a meal or a ride north in a borrowed car. In New York City, just before flying home, I wandered into a small music shop—and unknowingly met the man who would later become my husband.
The journey didn’t stop. It only shifted.
When life in New York didn’t quite click, I asked Teza—by then also in New York—what should come next.
“St. Thomas,” she said.
So I bought a one-way ticket to the Virgin Islands, chasing a name and a feeling. There, I found Cookie living on a tugboat, and with her help, I found my place again. I lived on sailboats, sometimes rowing a dinghy out to my floating home. I met sailors from around the world, including a Swiss couple who had built their boat by hand and crossed the Atlantic with their two young children. Their story reminded me that courage comes in many forms—and that it’s never too late to sail toward something new.
Eventually, I crewed a small sailboat on a trip through the Caribbean. The ocean became my teacher: move with the wind, trust your instincts, let go of what you can’t control.
The sailor in me never disappeared. Today, decades later, I’ve returned to sailing, relearning the ropes with wonderful instructors at the Leo Robbins Sailing Center in Ventura. And once again, the lesson is the same: learning never stops.
Neither did my journey. Over the years, I raised a family, took college classes, and took on all kinds of work—from medical transcription to administrative roles for a Mensa member and a flavor chemist. Sometimes I learned as I went, figuring things out one step at a time. Eventually, I landed a job in journalism—an unexpected turn that led to a career of more than twenty years.
And now? I’m learning again—this time, to incorporate AI into storytelling. Not to replace the human touch, but to support it. To sharpen it. To help others find their voice, just as I’m finding new ways to tell mine.
That’s what I love most about this moment we’re living through. Technology isn’t here to erase our stories. It’s here to help us capture them, to preserve them, and to pass them on.
You don’t need to have traveled the world to have a story worth telling. Your journey—whether it stretches across oceans or unfolds quietly in one town—matters.
And if you’re wondering where to start? Maybe the answer is simpler than you think.
You start by saying yes.
And you trust that the next step will reveal itself—as it always has.
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