Most vacations I know about don’t last 3 weeks. They’re usually 10 days or 2 weeks. Somehow we’re blessed with the gift of a house to sit and a car to drive and 3 weeks to do it. Actually, make that 24 days.
The first week is all about initial excitement, getting to know the nooks and crannies of where you’re staying, the view, the way the sun comes in at certain times of the day. Eating out. Utter abandon and bliss, more or less.
For the people who take one week only vacations, the fun is cut short. You don’t get to settle into your area and your sense of place has yet to develop. It’s an in and out.
Week two is the beginning of settling in. You start getting used to waking up in a foreign bed, backing out of the same driveway and perhaps recognizing the barista down the street. Whether or not you miss home, you can actually feel yourself adjusting to what was once novelty.
By the end of two weeks, you feel like you’ve taken a reasonable vacation, and it’s safe to say you’re satisfied enough to go home. Two weeks is the standard.
We’re in our third week, and I no longer feel like I’m on vacation. I feel like I’m a temporary resident who has settled in. Everything is familiar, but that’s not what I’m getting at. In fact, everything I’ve written is just rambling filler for what I’m trying to say:
This third week has been unexpectedly valuable. It has help solidify my goals by forcing me to meditate on why we like it here and what I can do to get us out of the mess we’re in.
It’s kind of like a curing stage, and really has nothing to do with vacation. It has to do with change and adjusting the mindset to realize that change. I couldn’t have done this last week because I was still bedazzled by the novelty.
This week the novelty is gone so I’m lucid. The obvious challenge, as mentioned before, is to keep that focus going through what is sure to be the roughest of times ahead.