When I’m visiting a new place everything I experience is in stereo and multi-color. It’s like I’m tasting a new food for the first time. Everyday mundane things like hosing down a sidewalk, the noise of morning traffic and the evening light reflecting off buildings are a sensory delight in a new city.

New York always does this to me. As I step out onto the sidewalk – I catch myself looking up at the buildings and looking down the long alleys. Locals are looking down at their phones as they wait for a train to arrive while I’m standing next to them noticing the smell of the subway and whoosh of warm air hitting my face as the train arrives. It’s delicious.

Back home, the downside of daily rituals is that I zone out the brilliance of everyday living. When I catch myself and wake up, I notice the joys of morning coffee, the fog rolling into San Francisco Bay, the smell of Eucalyptus or the hilly topography of San Francisco where every intersection has a new view.

Appreciating everyday routines increases my joy and makes the normal new.

“Look to this day:
For it is life, the very life of life.”

– Kalidasa