We need to take a break from travel on occasion, even during vacation. Certainly you've said to your sweet honey, "geez, if I see one more danged church...."

If you've been smart and rented a villa, you at least have a place to retreat to. There you can have afternoon tea, a ritual that reminds you that you're living, not just traveling.

There are outside rituals that you can participate in, too. The Italian passeggiata is one of them. In the evening, right about cocktail hour, folks get out of the house and slowly stroll over some selected streets of the town center. Old men like me can sit in a bar with a glass of wine and watch, ogling as appropriate. That's ritual to. And if you go to the same bar every night on your vacation, it becomes a more deeply embedded ritual. Soon folks come to expect you.

Eventually, if it all works out well, you'll feel like you're living wherever you are at the moment. You're no longer just a traveler, you're at home in the world.

But watch out. If you get good at this, you'll want to buy a house and set down roots.

The cool travel guide has an interesting post on the reward of rituals when we travel.