Yep, it’s a pretty slow day here at the homestead. We’re just sitting around and thinking, cogitating, mulling things over, chewing the fat with ourselves. You get the picture

When I find myself stuck in the mental doldrums where there is both everything and nothing to write about, I look for inspiration elsewhere.

I didn’t have to look far: This morning two beautiful pieces about traveling crossed my screen almost simultaneously.

The first is by my long-time friend Martha Nichols. In her piece, “Why Travel?” she describes what travel does to her “inner landscape.”

“When you go to a new place, you’re more vulnerable,” she writes. “It’s as if a crack of light opens in the clouds, illuminating your inner landscape as well as what’s passing outside.”

This piece reminds me that no matter how far I roam, I can never escape myself. Martha explains why the hard parts of travel are also the most valuable.

Then, over at Lost in Arles, my new friend Heather Robinson tells the story of how she came to live in Arles. She says it’s a story that bears repeating and I say it’s a story worth sharing.

“Inside an abandoned church, we looked at the work of Harry Gruyaert’s ‘Rivages,’ ” she recalls. “We turned ourselves towards beauty and that stirring surged up into tears. We knew. This was where we were ready to be.”

Indeed, Heather’s entire blog is a celebration of the beauty she finds in the landscape, villages, and food around her. Every one of her posts is un petit cadeau dropped into my inbox.

And then, because I also needed a bit of bucking up, I reread a favorite piece by Dominique Browning. “Go where the love is,” she advises.

“That means not only doing what you love, but being where people love you–where they understand what you do, and, more important, where they have an affinity for who you are. Where the wellspring of creativity can be nurtured.”

And that’s what I’ve been doing these past couple of years as I search for new ways of working. Her post reminds me that if I keep planting the right kind of seeds, something satisfying and meaningful will eventually take root.

And finally, I leave you with this video of fearless young women cruising down la Sierra de Madrid. I may have a middle-aged body, but my spirit still soars like a twenty-something’s and I can feel the wind in my face and the road vibrating under my wheels as I watch them sail down the mountain on their longboards.