From cozy cafés to delectable pastries, my ferry ride from Tromsø to Lofoten held many wonderful things, not to mention a lesson I still remember: Sometimes it’s the days we plan the least that hold the greatest gifts.
As Alain de Botton writes in The Art of Travel, there’s nothing like a train journey to inspire creative thought — so I hope the #TalesonRail artist-in-residence will bring inspiration to our own Moment Catchers community.
It was only by thinking about the birds that I could pin down what it is I love so much about the Northern Lights — that the lights are as animate and awe-inspiring as any creature in the universe; they’re alive.
As I sat and sketched in Tromsø, I loved looking up at the cathedral’s turquoise steeple, keeping time by the clocks on its churchtower, and thinking once again of my favorite equation for enoughness.
While getting to see Lofoten’s rugged peaks from the water was a welcome change in perspective, the greatest gift of our journey to Tromsø was the number of surprising connections it held.
To land in Stockholm, and have my first port-of-call be a place that some of my best friends had stayed in not two months earlier, was a welcome point of connection to my San Francisco community.
On a brisk Sunday morning in Stockholm, I can remember the feeling of being on the brink of it all. As though hidden behind a cobblestoned bend of its own, our future lay out of sight, but still within reach.
My time on Lofoten so far has reminded me of one of my favorite life lessons—that no matter how well we think we know what we need from a journey, sometimes the universe knows even better…
Here in Catalonia, where there’s such a debate taking place over the region’s future, it seemed all the more important—vital, even—to understand Girona’s past before I could begin to imagine its path forward.
For me, every connection is a tiny knot in the thousand fraying threads we carry with us. Every encounter is a part of the larger tapestry coming to life, slowly being woven into significance.