Tuesday 2:10 pm
Why do we vacate?
We vacate because we are just not that important. We leave town and life continues almost as if we had never been. We vacate to forget all about our trials and tribulations. They are traded for small difficulties easier to overcome: why does the car smell like some dead thing? I thought YOU were bringing the charger. How could we forget salt and pepper? Where is that one special shell I found, no not THAT one, the SPECIAL ONE! Most trials we meet on vacation can be overcome in an afternoon.
A do-nothing vacation with children is a beautiful thing. The rhythms of life anchor us – meals, naps, exercise, bed – the grownups are unusually present – perhaps there is beer. In doing the same thing each day we have space for discovery. Today’s beach and tomorrow’s beach are never quite the same to the keen eyed observer.
A woman in an expensive bath robe appears on the deck of a well appointed home. “This is private property! What do you want!?” she yells over the roar of the surf. What I want is for my two year old, who has just dropped his already gritty apple over the deck’s edge onto the dune, to turn around and march his buns down the staircase that leads to her home which unfortunately looks just like the public staircase we used to access this beach, this ocean that no one owns. I wonder if she is renting or owns the place. I wonder about the need to declare one’s territory to a toddler. A sign would do the trick, but no matter, we descend.
I am trying too hard today for a flow, a narrative, because it came so naturally the last two mornings. Perhaps that’s the magic of 5am waking. Today had I stayed up after the morning feeding it would have been 4:45 and I just couldn’t do it. And then Jr Jr woke again soon after anyway so it was the right choice.
I have had a large lunch and desperately desire to lie down. I am sure if I do that the backs of my legs will burn. The tide is creeping ever closer to my feet though I’m really high up on the beach. My brain has slowed to a completely stop. It wasn’t a good night of sleep last night. Perhaps I should return and nap. I don’t want to be inside in the cold on a beautiful day like this. The air condo is cranked so high. If I get up and move will I feel better?
It has taken almost forty minutes to write this much, ugh. I have fallen asleep and awoken several times. I don’t think the tide will reach my feet but it has come close. Once the life guard’s four wheeler startled me awake.
If going barefoot in the sand grounds your body and sets your ions straight, then what restorative wonders must the seaside nap entail?
I am still sad about the lost driftwood pendant. Perhaps tomorrow I will search for it and probably find other things instead.
Must walk in the surf to wake up. My soul never clambered up from the depths of sleep to alight in my body today. Some days are just like that I suppose.
We vacate to remember what it is like to do approximately nothing. To remember the feel of breath entering our bodies, to behold, breathless, the natural world and its utter ignorance of the worries of mankind. In a culture that knows no sabbath and a world that never shuts off, we vacate the premises of our daily anxieties and go somewhere else, anywhere really, to remember our flesh and our spirit. To feed the rich inner life the morsels of luxury that it deserves – a long rest, a brisk walk, a deep breath, a good read. We vacate to teach our children that adulthood, even adulthood, like the seas, must have its limits.
