Waking up in postcard-perfect town north of Boston yesterday. Out before dawn. Seeing snow falling (finally!). Wedging myself into the rental car and turning on NPR. This is the first song I hear. Having never heard it, I assumed it was by Jackson Browne. It sure sounds like Jackson Browne.

It’s by a band called Dawes, one of the many bands my friend Randy McDonald always tries to get me to listen to. Anyway, give it a listen.

Love the title, and the ethos of the song. I’ve been writing as a “job” for three decades, but I hadn’t been out of my apartment on “assignment” in two years. And in the past couple days, I remembered what I had missed: traveling to a place I’d never been to; learning about someone or some community I’d have otherwise not known about; sitting in a college president’s office that looks like something out of A Separate Peace. Meeting an extraordinary individual who is obsessed with being better. Finding a shoppe with the benches above. Exploration. Adventure.

Sure, writing is something I’ve always wanted to do (writing is just typing with hopefully more panache; I don’t want to oversell it). But if you were to ask me why I don’t regret having chosen this quasi-profession, it’s weeks like this one (which I used to experience all of the time, lucky me) that remind me. It’s the travel. The people. The adventure. It’s a little bit of everything.