I’m pleasantly surprised.

When I left for Turkey two weeks ago, there had never been a time in my life when I needed a vacation more. I knew that if I hadn’t gone then, something else would have given, and I just cannot afford to unravel right now. So I planned the type of vacation I needed: the kind with lots of intellectual stimulation, so that I couldn’t possibly think about work, and physical activity, to shake my body out of its ageing rut. Travelling is always an emotional refresher, a bit of a degausser of everyday life. But to be perfectly honest, I wasn’t sure this was going to happen this time, I doubted that two weeks would be enough to replenish the energy that’s been so recently elusive. I was wrong, and found myself last Friday in Istanbul pleasantly satisfied, looking forward to coming home, and to going back to work.

But crossing a few things off the life to-do list (getting a scrubdown at a 600-year-old Hamam, visiting Troy, scootering through Cappadocia) has that effect. Who knew?