Road Trip, Day Eleven: Return to the Family Home, Palo Alto, CA.

There is nothing quite like solo travel and exploration to bring you back to yourself. 

There are so many thoughts that have come streaming through, so much pure clarity, 

so much ease even in the midst of change. I've been thinking about the difference between vacation and travel. Vacation to me summons trying to escape from one's life, 

to leave it all behind, to "relax" and push it all away. And then there is travel, 

where we take it in, we ask for more input, more experiences, newness, 

we see another culture, another town, another way of life…and for a minute we try it on.

And even if we don't stay, we carry a bit of it with us. I am carrying so much input, 

and so much gratitude. There are so many visual moments to take in when traveling 

that you wish your eye lenses were indeed the lens of a camera, that to just look 

you could capture those moments to share with others so that they might understand 

why you are changed. There is the magnificence of redwoods bursting from flat forest floors, towering…truly towering over everything. I know that I feel small when standing 

at the edge of the sea, but the sea seems like a collection of so many things, 

while a redwood seems like an "it", a singular being. Those sweetly scented trees 

feel like history and hope. I wish I could show you how it looks to drive down the 

windingest road of the coast, where two feet from your right side tires is a cliff 

plunging down to a teal sea, the broken grapevine fence on the left is roughly containing

white sheep with black heads who are content in green pasture with bright yellow 

wild mustard flowers dancing in the breeze, you pass the second cemetery of the day, 

this one with a rough white picket fence. There are the barns, the homesteads, 

the shacks, the cabins that all call to me, saying "you could have this life." 

And me calling back, not yet. We could all be so many things, we could lead 

so many lives, we could do so many jobs. And I hope that in my life I will be lucky
 enough to try on a few more lives. For now I am clear, MAKE ART, make a home,
 see the world, be in nature deeply and often, and share all this with the many in
your life you are truly blessed to call friends.