I have always wanted to go to a poetry retreat center of some kind, and write in the mountains. For years I wrote during my commute to and from work, on the DC metro. But of course I don’t do that anymore. I would hear of other writers who had a dedicated place to write — an outdoor shed turned into a writing studio for example. I wanted that. I wanted some place with a window to mountains and nature, some place to milk the Muse juice from my head.

Coming here, I finally have my wish. In case you missed my previous post, nature surrounds me. Monkeys and bison galore. Mountains and fog and beautiful flora. Scattered Eucalyptus bark.

This past weekend my family took a trip to Munnar in the state of Kerala. As we drove away, I was very happy to know I was coming back. The Western Ghats are so beautiful. And as we drove down the mountain, I realized that aside from living close to family, this was the first and only time I have ever gone on vacation — or left home home to go anywhere — and feeling like I had to come back. Never before has “home” been a place of necessary return.

 We passed so many tea farms, hundreds of thousands of tea plants. I can also identify a coffee plant for the first time in my life. After we arrived, Ketaki and I left the boys at the hotel in search for tea, and just happened to find it at a tea stall outside of town. If we hadn’t stopped there, we would have missed the best view we had the entire trip and we would never have taken this awesome video.

Yes, I feel like the world I now call my home is that peaceful gorgeous place I have longed for, that place where I can write and not feel jealous of other writers and their writing places. It is a place where the full potential of art can be realized.

Writers and artists reading this, why is place so important to create?

I have always wanted to go to a poetry retreat center of some kind, and write in the mountains. For years I wrote during my commute to and from work, on the DC metro. But of course I don’t do that anymore. I would hear of other writers who had a dedicated place to write — an outdoor shed turned into a writing studio for example. I wanted that. I wanted some place with a window to mountains and nature, some place to milk the Muse juice from my head.

Coming here, I finally have my wish. In case you missed my previous post, nature surrounds me. Monkeys and bison galore. Mountains and fog and beautiful flora. Scattered Eucalyptus bark.

This past weekend my family took a trip to Munnar in the state of Kerala. As we drove away, I was very happy to know I was coming back. The Western Ghats are so beautiful. And as we drove down the mountain, I realized that aside from living close to family, this was the first and only time I have ever gone on vacation — or left home home to go anywhere — and feeling like I had to come back. Never before has “home” been a place of necessary return.

 We passed so many tea farms, hundreds of thousands of tea plants. I can also identify a coffee plant for the first time in my life. After we arrived, Ketaki and I left the boys at the hotel in search for tea, and just happened to find it at a tea stall outside of town. If we hadn’t stopped there, we would have missed the best view we had the entire trip and we would never have taken this awesome video.

Yes, I feel like the world I now call my home is that peaceful gorgeous place I have longed for, that place where I can write and not feel jealous of other writers and their writing places. It is a place where the full potential of art can be realized.

Writers and artists reading this, why is place so important to create?