“If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need.” – Marcus Tullius Cicero (Ancient Roman Lawyer, Writer 106 BC-43 BC)

For the past few months, my family and I have been in the process of moving across the world from Prague back to our native Ohio, USA. As I’m finding out, it takes a long time to move across the sea.

While we’ve been waiting on our beds and other essentials to arrive with the shipment from Prague, life has gone on. My boys are getting taller and growing. We’ve been making friends and enjoying the American way of living again. And now, eight weeks later, our essentials have arrived.

Sometimes it’s the smallest of things that make a place feel like home. I love having ice in a glass of water again, a picture or two on the wall, and a table to sit around with my family at the end of the day. It’s wonderful being home.

As I unpack and arrange our home again, I remember that, besides family and health, the two things I personally love having are:

1) a garden

2) a library / studio

I agree with Cicero.

A library and a garden are two things that in some walks of life unnecessary, but for me are fuel for my soul.

I’m rejoicing at having a place with a writing chair, a library of my favorite books, a desk to edit photographs, and an easel set up with my work-in-progress canvas. And I love having fresh roses from the garden, which is coming along, too.

How about you? What are your favorite, most necessary spaces? Do you enjoy having a special place to refill your soul?