I thought I’d come home from Spain and Italy inspired by the fashion.

And I did.

But I think I came home more inspired by life.

The joy of simply being around people

One of the things I noticed most was how often people simply exist around other people.

Town squares full in the evening. Tiny conversations with strangers. Children at restaurants, concerts and cafés. People walking somewhere just to buy bread or fruit. Sitting outside without needing an activity attached to it.

After months of concussion recovery, that hit me especially hard.

Recovery has required a lot of quiet, regulating, dark rooms and stepping away when my brain has had enough. At times, it’s been incredibly isolating.

I don’t think I understood how much those tiny, everyday interactions with other humans mattered until I had been missing them.

Since coming home, I’ve even found myself seeking out our local town square just to be around people. Not necessarily to do anything. Just to be part of the world happening around me.

Food can be part of the joy

Then there was the food.

Somewhere along the Mediterranean, I remembered that cooking can actually be fun.

Since having my daughter, my husband has largely become the chef in our house. But since coming home, even he’s noticed that I’m suddenly excited to cook again.

There was something about seeing food treated not simply as another thing that needs to get done, but as an experience worth enjoying.

Choosing good ingredients. Making something delicious. Sitting down together. Taking your time.

I realized I was working too much

Perhaps the biggest realization was this:

I was working too much.

Having a true vacation gave my nervous system a break in a way I hadn’t experienced in a very long time.

I came home with more capacity, more creativity and a much clearer sense that rest cannot always be the thing I squeeze in after everything else is finished.

Because everything is never finished.

There will always be another email. Another product to photograph. Another load of laundry. Another thing I could be doing.

But there is also dinner to enjoy. An outfit to wear. A child who wants to come along. A park bench in the sun. A walk for absolutely no reason. People to sit beside.

Sustainability applies to our lives, too

I have a Master’s in Environmental Studies, and as the woman behind a female- and disabled-owned sustainable Canadian business, I spend a lot of time thinking about what a more sustainable way of living actually looks like.

Usually, we talk about sustainability in terms of what we buy, what things are made from and how long we keep them.

Those things matter enormously to me and to Le Prix.

But this trip made me think about sustainability in another way:

Are we creating lives we can actually sustain?

Lives with room for rest.

For other people.

For good food.

For getting dressed just because it makes us happy.

For being outside.

For doing things that have absolutely nothing to do with productivity.

Slower. More connected. More joyful. More outside.

Bringing it home

I don’t want to leave Europe behind as a place I visited.

I want to bring it home with me.

I want to bring home the long dinners, the full squares, the spontaneous conversations, the beautiful clothes, the slower mornings and the feeling that ordinary life is worth showing up for.

Not to recreate Europe exactly, but to let it change the way I live here.

To wear the beautiful clothes instead of saving them.

To sit outside because the sun is shining.

To take my daughter along instead of feeling like life has to be divided into “kid time” and everything else.

To cook something because making it sounds joyful.

To be around other people.

And to occasionally let something on the to-do list wait until tomorrow.

Because life isn’t the thing that happens once the work is done.

This is the life.