After seven weeks of not writing, I am ready to have a creative outlet again. It’s not so much that I had a busy summer or even that I’ve had nothing to say; mostly, it was a little of both.
Summer wasn’t supposed to be busy because my kids had very little camp time and we had no big trips planned. It was a lackadaisical kind of a thing, a day to day existence without rhyme or reason or routine. Somehow, without anything significant or major to occupy our time, we passed week after week going from one town to the next like renaissance minstrels, rather than the vaudeville kind. We started and ended the summer with beach trips, and managed to fit two more beach trips in between. We visited family, we went to a concert, we traveled around the tri-state area (pick any three states; it really doesn’t matter). The whole time, it rained almost every day and the temperatures never soared above a temperate mid 80’s. This clearly was not our typical summer.
As each week went by,
we got more and more used to doing less and less. I went to the gym less. I put
on less makeup and made myself less presentable. I exercised less self-control
when it came to cartons of ice cream and things covered in chocolate. I was
less strict about enforcing bedtimes. It seemed less important to get out of
bed early, especially if it was raining. I stopped caring if everyone ate less
healthy at less regular intervals.
My daughters took full advantage of our simplified summer. Less rules. Less piano and guitar practice.
Less shopping and crafts and organized activities. As the summer went on, they
spent less time with friends, and the end result was they fought with each
other less. Sure, they were less social, but there was less reason to be. And the best part is I couldn’t have cared less.
Yes, I had less time for me, but sometimes less is more. The
more time I spent with my kids, the more I enjoyed them for who they are. The
less I did, the more I relaxed. The less I yelled, the more we all laughed.
It wasn’t like we were hitchhiking across the country, stopping
in towns and washing dishes in diners and sleeping on strangers’ floors until
we saved enough to go to the next town. In fact, it was nothing like that, as
there was no anonymous sex or drug use involved. But still, it was as close to
vagabond as we’ve ever been, my over-protected upper middle class suburban
children and I. Maybe next summer I will take it a step farther. I’ve give them
each a stick with a bandana on the end and a can of pork and beans and drop
them off at some railroad tracks and tell them to not come back for eight
weeks. Wait, then I’d see them less, and I’m pretty sure I would miss them
after the first month.
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