Perhaps this happens to you? You go on a trip someplace, and come home filled with the desire to make changes, to simplify and purge, to get things done, to live fully and embrace life.

Or is it just me?

I came home from our trip to New England filled with plans to:

Redo my schedule, setting aside much more time for reading and writing.

Learn about early American history.

Read and reread Louisa May Alcott’s works, and Walden. (FYI: note that Walden and Little Women are both free through Amazon’s Kindle. Links are below.)

Clean out all my closets.

And much more. Will I do those things? I don’t know—it depends on how long my recharging lasts. (I am so missing the cool, crisp weather, for it is repulsively warm and humid here right now, but We Will Not Speak of This. Cooler days are coming, I just need to hang on!)

I’ll write more about the trip next week, and share more photos, but today I’ll give you a little taste of two of my favorite experiences. (Click to enlarge the photos.)

Walden Pond

I read and enjoyed Walden several years ago, though I’m embarrassed to say it didn’t make much of a lasting impression on me. Still, when I found that we could visit Walden Pond, and see the site of Thoreau’s cabin while we were in Concord, I jumped at the chance. And I’m so glad I did. Walden Pond is a “kettle hole,” formed by a retreating glacier, in some places over 100 feet deep. We were able to walk all the way around it, soaking up the fresh air, the bright leaves, and watching people enjoying the park in their own ways—we saw men fishing, several families with children walking in the woods, a paddle boarder and two wetsuit-clad people swimming! Even though there were quite a few others there (and I’m sure it’s mobbed in the warmer months), it didn’t feel crowded and you could sense the peace and beauty that must have drawn Thoreau here.

Orchard House

Just down the road from Walden sits Orchard House, the Alcott (as in Louisa May) family home for 20 years. Louisa May Alcott wrote Little Women while living here, at a small half-circle of a desk her father built into a wall of her room. (No photos were allowed inside, so I can’t show you what it looked like.) The house was already old when the Alcotts lived there, with the settling you’d expect of an old house. Orchard House was named for the apple orchard that once surrounded it, but Louisa called it “Apple Slump” because she felt like it was “slumping” into the ground, according to our tour guide. The Alcotts were an interesting and talented family—one of Louisa’s sisters was an actress, the other an artist—we saw much of her art work in the home, including sketches drawn directly on window casings and woodwork of her room. Alcott’s father, Bronson, was a philosopher and educator (though his revolutionary ideas about education kept him from being successful in his day) and her mother was essentially what we’d now call a social worker, according to our guide. The home was simple and warm, and filled with many items that belonged to the family, since Orchard House had only one owner after the Alcotts, and became a museum in 1911.

Now back to laundry and sorting through travel ephemera and photos. Stay tuned next week for autumn leaves, historic houses and more!

Robert Morgan, who lives in Ithaca, New York, has long been one of my favorite American poets. He’s also a fine novelist and, recently, the biographer of Daniel Boone. His poems are often about customs and folklore, and this one is a good example. [Introduction by Ted Kooser.]

Living Tree

It’s said they planted trees by graves

to soak up spirits of the dead

through roots into the growing wood.

The favorite in the burial yards

I knew was common juniper.

One could do worse than pass into

such a species. I like to think

that when I’m gone the chemicals

and yes the spirit that was me

might be searched out by subtle roots

and raised with sap through capillaries

into an upright, fragrant trunk,

and aromatic twigs and bark,

through needles bright as hoarfrost to

the sunlight for a century

or more, in wood repelling rot

and standing tall with monuments

and statues there on the far hill,

erect as truth, a testimony,

in ground that’s dignified by loss,

around a melancholy tree

that’s pointing toward infinity.

American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation (www.poetryfoundation.org), publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2012 by Robert Morgan, whose most recent book of poems is Terroir, Penguin Poets, 2011. Poem reprinted from The Georgia Review, Spring 2012, by permission of Robert Morgan and the publisher. Introduction copyright © 2013 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction's author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006.

By the time you read this, my husband and I will be on the road in New England, taking our very-belated 25^th anniversary trip. We’re hoping to see some fall foliage, enjoy crisp autumn air, and explore an area of the country we’ve never visited before. You can bet that I’m hoping to see some places of literary interest, like Concord, MA where Louisa May Alcott lived, and perhaps also Mark Twain’s home in Connecticut. We’ll be on the lookout for used book stores, places to sketch and take photos, quaint restaurants and shops…pretty much whatever strikes our fancy. I promise a full report when we return!

Have a great weekend!

“Though we travel the world over to find the beautiful, we must carry it with us or we find it not.”

—Ralph Waldo Emerson

Gratitude has much to do with happiness, and I sometimes forget to stop and think about what I’m grateful for. As a part of paying more attention to my life, I’m making it a regular practice to jot down what I’m grateful for at least once a week. Here are just five things I came up with this morning:

Libraries. I’ve learned so much from library books (how to grow herbs in Florida, where to stay and eat in Boston, what is a happiness project?). I’ve been entertained by fiction and magazines, DVDs and CDs. I can download free music (through Freegal) and borrow materials from libraries all across the country. And those are just the services I use. My library offers much, much more. I don’t know what I’d do without the library system and I’m so grateful to be able to access it.

“Ordinary.” I love my daily routines and “ordinary” life (which I know is a very nice one). I don’t need anything big and extravagant to happen—I’m 99 percent content with the stuff of everyday life. That is a huge blessing.

My office. When I walked in here this morning and flipped on the light, I felt a rush of peace, contentment and happiness. I’m grateful to have my own space to inspire and recharge me.

My mother-in-law. She’s one of my best friends, and I know I’m lucky to feel that way.

Freedom to set my own schedule. I have plenty to do—as do we all—but I answer only to myself. I can decide when to write, when to cook or clean, when to run errands or when to chuck it all and play. I’m in charge, and sometimes I forget that. When I contemplate working in an office for someone else, I’m grateful that, for now, I don’t have to.

What are you grateful for?