There is nothing like traveling in another country to get your creative juices flowing and jolt all of your senses into high alert. Entering another time zone, hearing another language, eating different food, seeing new people and places can usher you into a different, more expansive mindset where anything and everything is possible. This was the case during our recent trip to Sweden, with marvelous stops in Gothenburg, Stockholm and Uppsala.
What made this even more memorable was being hosted by friends at the front and back ends of our journey. To see the way other people live, how they decorate their homes, what they plant in their gardens, what they wear, how they spend their time, what they talk and care about — these kinds of intimate experiences make traveling even richer. We were fortunate to time our visit with their Midsummer Celebration filled with eating, drinking and dancing, while wearing handcrafted crowns made from birch branches and flowers!
This heightened state of curiosity is the stuff of great travel. The trick is packing it into your suitcase and carrying it home into your daily life. One week ago, I awoke to a crisp morning in the loft of a small, modern cabin near a fiord on the coast of Sweden. Today, I awoke in my beloved 112-year-old home in the Oakwood/Mordecai neighborhood on a hot, sultry day. Holding onto the mindset that wherever you are, the world is full of wonder and beauty and delight is the gift of travel.