The word vacation derives from the late Middle English vacate meaning “be unoccupied”and from the Latin verb vacare which means “left empty.”In a world which is constantly messaging us to stay busy, to fill our hours and days to the brim, to do more and more and more, to follow all the food rules, the idea of leaving some empty space and choosing at times to be unoccupied sounds foreign and against the rules we have been given.
But there are times we need to claim and celebrate being unoccupied, to dance in the empty spaces and vacate some of those demanding rules. We need to enjoy this unoccupied time. No rules, no shame, no guilt.
I recently had to admit to a friend that the last time my grandchildren visited, my husband and our daughter (said grandchildren’s mom) went out to a restaurant for a little father-daughter time and I stayed with the grandchildren. We ate popcorn and candy and watched the Game Show Network. This was definitely not their (or my) daily fare but it was fun because of that. No rules, no shame, no guilt. Just fun. Ridiculously pure fun. We laughed and giggled and found that we are exceptionally worthy game show contestants when deliciously fueled by a sugar high.
One of my dearest friends recently shared a photo with me of her sitting on the kitchen floor with her two grandsons as they shared a pint of Ben and Jerry’s Karamel Sutra ice cream. No rules, no shame, not guilt. The three of them all looked blissfully happy.
It’s not just about the sugar. Okay, maybe it is a little about the sugar. But I think it is more about just doing what is so often “forbidden” or looked down upon by those who live those perfect glossy magazine lives. Why would anyone go on vacation and say, “Let’s just stay with our regular fare of eating salads every day.”
At the beach last summer, I noticed that the big box of Cheez-its was the first to empty. Then the pop tarts and next the Rice Krispie treats. Why would we deny ourselves a trip to Dairy Queen for Blizzards and soft serve? My grandchildren will have no happy memories about the delicious whole wheat orzo and feta salad I made for lunch one day. They will remember the bag of candy their mom pulled out for our prizes when we were playing board games.
Sometimes we need to take a break. Not just from our everyday foods but from our everyday routines. Our spiritual lives will not crumble if we skip meditation for a few days or decide not to go to church while on vacation. Life will feel marvelous with the television turned off and everyone’s nose in a good book for hours on end.
When I think back on childhood vacations I realize now that my parents were also taking a break—from work, from maintaining the house, from usual routines. I think my dad loved it that we would all go out and play on the beach so he could have the whole beach cottage to himself. Ah, quiet. Peace.
I think my mom loved it because she could play. No job to rush to or kids to drive hither and thither. Just sit on the beach and enjoy the sun and the surf and watch us build sand castles and what she called “toad houses” where we packed wet sand over and around her bare feet and then she gently slipped her feet out and up to create little houses.
When I was a child our beach vacation was the only time my mom bought those packages with all the tiny little boxes of cereal. At home we had one big box of Cheerios or an economy size Rice Krispies but no tiny Sugar Pops or Count Choculas. Plus at the beach we could eat the cereal right out of the little boxes if we didn’t want to have them with milk.
For breakfast we had white bread toast that my mom broiled in the bottom drawer of the gas oven (which was in itself rather exotic to me as I didn’t even know they made such things). She would slather the bread with butter (in truth, it was probably margarine) which melted and crisped to a wonderful golden brown.
We had marvelously greasy donuts from Britt’s on the boardwalk of Carolina Beach. Coins were handed out when we heard the tinkling tune of the ice cream truck coming down the street near our cottage. Popsicles every day! No rules, no shame no guilt.
Each morning my Dad would give my brother and I money to go buy him the morning paper at the little corner grocery a few blocks away; he always gave us extra money so we could, as he would instruct, “get yourselves a treat.” The treat was usually a popsicle of some variety. Yes, popsicles for breakfast. Yum!
In the evenings there was soft serve ice cream or a fluffy cone of perfectly pink cotton candy as we walked along the boardwalk.
I remember one vacation trip to Washington, DC when we went out for dinner on a houseboat. Was that restaurant really on a houseboat? That is my memory. What I remember most is the thrill of having my first Shirley Temple, that bubbly drink made with ginger ale, grenadine and topped with a maraschino cherry! I felt so grown up.
Pennsylvania vacations meant a stop at the A&W Root Beer stand for root beer floats, which, in truth, I detested. I am still not a fan of root beer, but for my Dad, those floats marked the real beginning of a vacation to his childhood home. I honored without complaint his need for that iconic stop.
There were few fast food restaurants when I was growing up, but that was a plus as we stopped along the way for a picnic my mother had packed—fried chicken, country ham biscuits, homemade toll house cookies and other things we never had for lunch at home.
What were the unusual spaces in your family vacations? Did the foods change? Were you allowed a treat that never would happen back at home? How did you spend the hours that were emptied out during the time away?
We have a need to claim some unoccupied territory. I think the reason there are often foods that go along with this is we have become a culture of so many food rules that it is hard to keep up at times
Take a break. Stop with the guilt and the shame. You can go back to your keto or paleo or lettuce diet as soon as your feet cross the threshold when you return home. But give it a rest. A real vacation. Most importantly do it for your children, your grandchildren, your self. Life is short and I for one am praying that heaven is not one big gilded salad bar. Dance. Sing. Eat ice cream. No rules, no shame, no guilt.
We always looked for a creek to splash in for our traveling picnics. We would have “pix-stix” in a can instead of chips in a bag (they got crushed). And those.BIG single dill pickles in a vacuum-sealed bag from the deli section! Thanks for evoking such weet memories…
Wow, this brings back so many memories for me. Thank you. My mantra now will be "no rules, no shame, no guilt."