On returning from Italy, this was exactly how I felt:

“Now, little by little, I redeveloped an eye for the humors of life, and I found it easier and increasingly possible to reconcile myself with my fate and not begrudge myself the odd tasty morsel or so in the feast of life. Indeed, when you travel back home from Italy, it is always like that. You snap your fingers at principles and prejudices, smile indulgently, thrust your hands in your trouser-pockets and see yourself as a shrewd man of the world. You have moved around for a brief while in the comfortable and warm life of the South and you are under the illusion that it will continue like that in your own country. Those were my feelings every time I came back from Italy and more especially on that occasion. When I reached Basel and found the old, inflexible way of life, unchanged and unchangeable, depressed and angry, I  graudally left my gaiety behind and came down to earth. But I had gained something from my experiences and never after this did my small boat sail through clear or troubled water without at least one colored pennant fluttering its confident defiance.”

- Herman Hesse, from Peter Camenzind