Where did you last go on vacation?
Was it last week? Last month? Yesterday or five years ago?
Do you remember the feeling leading up to it? Counting days, big X’s on the calendar to mark time as it ticked by… never wanting to wish the days away, but only wishing a certain day closer. What to pack, what to wear. Maybe a full itinerary to work on, or day dreams of mornings that turn into evenings with little to nothing filling the time yet feeling complete as you end the day.
The vacations I most looked forward to were those summers we spent camping in the back woods of Maine. “Twenty miles in on dirt logging road” as my parents always described it to people. The middle of nowhere, and oh so beautiful. I was just six when we started going.. and made lifelong friends during that first visit. Each of our family’s would return for the same weeks each summer, and as we ANXIOUSLY waited for our bikes to be taken off the cars, it was like minutes had passed since we were last there, and not an entire year. Hand-written letters filling the days until we’d see each other again… telling tales of different hometowns and friends at school.
Our days were filled with nothing but racing our bikes around the campground, swimming, and boat rides up the lake.
So simple, and yet so much anticipation to get back there again.
And once there, once any of us are anywhere on vacation… we pray for time to stand still. We silently see the days slipping by, never marking them. Not wanting to count. Not wanting it to end. How did it go by so fast?
And so the anticipation of vacation begins again.
One of my first vacations: Lake Champlain, NY:
