Vacation A-Ha Moment

I came back from Hawaii in late January. I was there with my daughter (who was nearly 2 at the time) and my parents for 4 weeks. My husband came for 2 weeks and my sister replaced him for the last 2 weeks. I realized it was probably the first 4-week vacation I'd had since grade school because I've had a job ever since I was 14. While in Hawaii, I didn't have to work, for the most part. I got phone calls from the office, but I didn't have to be there in the day to day of it all, gnashing my teeth or putting out a fire. And I didn't have to be home either, where the laundry piles up, or the dishes pile up, or where resentments can pile up if you're not careful to spend enough time with your family.

Four weeks of "Getting Away from It All." It was amazing that it actually happened since taking time off always feels too indulgent somehow, like I haven't earned it. But I got a dressing down from my doctor about needing to offset the stress of a new business, so I took her professional advice and took off!

I didn't do anything amazing - I didn't swim with dolphins or walk through the middle of a rainbow. I went to the Farmer's Markets, I cooked a lot, I bought art for my office, I read, I learned how to use one of the game functions on my cell phone. I went to the beach where I watched Gretchen hit the ocean for the first time. I visited family. I got sick. But I wasn't in Sonoma, entrenched in the things that can bog me down.

It's often not until you go somewhere else that you realize 2 things almost simultaneously:

1. the somewhere you're from has it's own set of wonderfulnesses but
2. somewhere-elses are good to get away to every once in awhile
   

Turning 40 doesn't need to be a big ordeal. But it often is, especially for women. I wish I could say I'm beyond all that and it doesn't matter. But it does. And it matters for reasons that aren't even cosmetic. Those are in there, mixed in with everything else. But it's other things that are subtle and make you realize you've gotten older. Like singing in the elevator.

I probably can't escape the inevitable - I will probably continue tapping my foot when Billy Idol comes on overhead, mouthing the words to "Rebel Yell" as an 18-year old next to me pauses in wonder at the spectacle of a getting-older-quickly lady rocking out to some unknown rock 'n' roll relic. But I can escape from my everyday every once in awhile.

Maybe you need to do a little of that as well. Maybe you haven't made time for your family, or for yourself, or for Fido. If you're feeling the pull and need to "Get Away from It All," why not come help me celebrate getting older as I take off for the Big Island of Hawai'i to party on? (<-- that begs a Wayne's World reference, or perhaps a his-name-used-to-be-Prince-before-he-named-himself-after-an-unpronouncable-symbol song reference dating back to 1999, but I shall desist...)