I decided that when Sanel does in fact realize his dream of drinking in an Irish pub, he won’t be disappointed. It was warm, it was human, it was the feeling of many people in a small room. And when you thought about it, you could almost smell the coast.
You have to do this every now and then, don’t you? Give your wonder a chance to breathe and marvel at where life has brought you: to Bosnia, to a family’s back garden, to a table beneath a pomegranate tree.
I could not be more grateful to have stumbled into this corner of the world. Mostar has reminded me that when we travel – and, more importantly, live – with open hearts and minds, connections happen.
While “From Prague to Petra” will unfortunately not meet its fitting end in the Wadi Rum desert, I hope you’ll understand the redirections and keep following along this journey. Thank you as always for reading!
Seeking the holy in the everyday is what has kept me in Vienna longer than I expected to be: lingering in café after café, feeding my new addiction to Wiener melanges, and reveling in routines made reverent.
We had come to lose the distance, to seek connections between this side of the family tree and our own. Just as we were able to view a star cluster three million light years away, so will we leave the Czech Republic calling strangers family.
I think about how we had planned to visit here earlier in the day, about how my own sketch had set us back a few hours, and can only marvel at this sudden twist of serendipity. What if we’d missed Ivo? What if our paths hadn’t crossed?
As I finish my first sketch of Prague in the dark – of elegant buildings and the cobblestoned way – our waiter brings over a candle and sets it down by my paint box. I’m surprised by how much light it casts across my sketchbook, and moved by his kind gesture.
I’m fascinated by how different the sketches in this Summer’s Sketchbook are. I’ve always loved that about art – how we each draw with our own “voice.” How boring would it be if we all sketched the world exactly the same?
My absolute favorite part of sketching around Southeast Asia and Japan was sharing the journey with you, so I’d like to invite you to join me on this next sketching adventure from Prague to Petra – I have a feeling it’s going to be good.