I Need A Vacation

The tank of the toilet was broken, by their child banging too hard on it,  sending water gushing onto the bathroom floor, shutting down a needed bathroom, and necessitating an emergency visit from a plumber, and a new toilet to replace the old one.

When their young child came out of a bedroom with a gash in the head and blood running down the face, a fast trip was forced to be made to a local doctor to stitch up the wound. The screams from the resistant child surely traumatized the other patients waiting to be seen. 

Their car broke down on the New Jersey Turnpike, stranding the family on the side of the road, delaying their trip to the shore. On the way home, the car limped along, having to be filled with the fluid it kept losing, every hour along the way.

The car’s warning light flashed on. Attention demanded to be paid. When having it looked at to learn what was wrong, Many hours from home, they were told “This car can’t be driven home”

While on a short sightseeing vacation to another country hours away by air, the parents received an emergency call that their young son broke his leg playing ball, requiring surgery right away. 

Their luggage didn’t return with them on the plane home. It was more than a week before they were reunited with needed medications, clothes that were essential, and personal belongings that were very inconvenient to live without. 

They were forced to spend an extra $750 they really couldn’t afford, to get to their destination before it was too late. It was the fault of the airline that they missed their connection. 

Their child’s head crashed into a window while the family were guests for the week in someone else's home, breaking it, the window, not the child (fortunately). The parents were mortified at the damage. 

A raging allergy to cats was created when unknowingly sleeping overnight on the spot where their host family’s cat often slept, coating the Christmas holiday with a Benadryl haze.

The car suddenly experienced a catastrophic leak, losing all of its oil in a few moments, stranding them on an icy, frigid winter’s day right before Christmas. They had to wait hours for a tow truck and an Uber ride home because of the many other accidents that day, undoing the relaxation they had just experienced. 

Each one of these are true. 

They really happened. They happened to Someone To Tell It To’s leadership team members over the years, while on vacations and what were meant to be days of respite, relaxation, and revitalization. 

Vacations can be wonderful. The change of pace and scenery. The opportunities to sights we’ve longed to see. The time to reconnect while putting work and other obligations aside. 

But often, especially when on vacation with children or others, plans don’t always go as imagined. People vacationing together don’t always enjoy all the same things. Planes, trains, and automobiles don’t always work as they should. Toilets break. Accidents happen. Weather doesn’t always cooperate. And we still take our quirks, prejudices, and many of our troubles with us when we leave home. Sometimes, vacation is just the same responsibilities, challenges, and obligations taken to another location. 

It’s also been said that people are often at their least patient on vacation. We’ve waited - often for an entire year or more - and are deeply ready to put our everyday lives aside for something different - something more fun, less obligatory, with fewer responsibilities. But it’s not always as easy to do as we dream it will be. Life and its challenges accompany us wherever we go and often frustrate us. We grow weary of following all the everyday rules. We’ve spent a lot of money to be on vacation and we want to get our money’s worth. We often have outsized expectations of what the time off will bring. We easily can become more demanding and more critical, casting aside politeness and civility as a break from daily interactions, all in favor of having the perfect time off and away. We let down, and in the process lose our patience and decorum. At our most self-involved, we can think it’s also a vacation from civility, from looking out for others, from considering others’ feelings and needs. 

In our most frustrated moments, we feel as if we need a vacation from the vacation.

Still, emergencies sometimes happen, always inconveniently. A change of location, without many of the familiar things of home can be disconcerting for us. Our personalities and idiosyncrasies rarely change just because we’re at a different place or on vacation. We can never predict when or how transportation may break down. Or when weather might derail our plans.  Or when someone will get sick, be injured, or have a less-than-great day. 

Even on vacation. 

The “real world” still breaks in and complicates our days and nights.

In the midst of this traditional vacation season of the year for so many of us, it’s always important to listen - to our own hearts, spirits, and bodies, and to the voices of the others around us - for their needs, feelings, and hopes. We all need to rest and relax and rejuvenate. That’s a given. For it all to work for everyone to have their best experiences, it’s vital to respect others, to consider their needs, and to listen. Always to listen to ourselves and to others around us. Especially on vacation. At its best, it can be a time of deeper connection and reconnection that we all so deeply need.