"Happiness is not a state to arrive at, but a manner of traveling."
I love that quote from Margaret Lee Runbeck - and I believe it! For me, it's the going, not the getting there that matters most. Best to avoid the danger of focusing too much on some dreamed-of, ballyhooed destination (in travel, or in life), postponing fun or happiness till we "arrive" there. No. So much of the joy is in the journey, discovered unexpectedly along the way.
Had a fine trip from Ottumwa, Iowa to Emeryville, California and back on Amtrak's California Zephyr. Out of five and a half days away from home, four full days were spent on the train - and in coach! But it was a fabulous ride - wouldn't have changed a thing. Sure I missed my shower on those days, and then there was a bit of sleep deprivation . . . but I don't intend to let cleanliness get in the way of a train adventure, and I can always sleep when I'm dead, right? : )
Had just one day in San Francisco, and yes, I think I did leave a piece of my heart in that gorgeous city - could have happily stayed longer. But could I have traded the sweet hypnotic sway of all those railroad miles, with such an astonishing variety of American landscape rolling by my window, for the sake of more time at my destination? Would I have missed watching the Zephyr's lengthening shadow swallow the pole line as the day goes down golden along the original Transcontinental Railroad in Nevada? No way, baby, not a chance!! ; )
"Happiness is not a state to arrive at, but a manner of traveling."
I love that quote from Margaret Lee Runbeck - and I believe it! For me, it's the going, not the getting there that matters most. Best to avoid the danger of focusing too much on some dreamed-of, ballyhooed destination (in travel, or in life), postponing fun or happiness till we "arrive" there. No. So much of the joy is in the journey, discovered unexpectedly along the way.
Had a fine trip from Ottumwa, Iowa to Emeryville, California and back on Amtrak's California Zephyr. Out of five and a half days away from home, four full days were spent on the train - and in coach! But it was a fabulous ride - wouldn't have changed a thing. Sure I missed my shower on those days, and then there was a bit of sleep deprivation . . . but I don't intend to let cleanliness get in the way of a train adventure, and I can always sleep when I'm dead, right? : )
Had just one day in San Francisco, and yes, I think I did leave a piece of my heart in that gorgeous city - could have happily stayed longer. But could I have traded the sweet hypnotic sway of all those railroad miles, with such an astonishing variety of American landscape rolling by my window, for the sake of more time at my destination? Would I have missed watching the Zephyr's lengthening shadow swallow the pole line as the day goes down golden along the original Transcontinental Railroad in Nevada? No way, baby, not a chance!! ; )