Are Vacations Worth It?

“Time you enjoyed wasting is not wasted time.” – T.S. Eliot

In my last post I worried I’d lost the ability to pass time in a perfectly useless manner. Only minutes into vacation I discovered, like riding a bike, the knack comes back quickly. Though I thoroughly enjoyed exploring Saint Augustine and I do feel well rested, I can’t help but wonder if vacations are worth it.

Here are a few of the reasons I’m thinking they’re not:

Time, except in hospitals, airports and airplanes, moves at a rather fast clip. Vacation time, however, passes with the speed of light. No sooner had we set up camp in the North Beach RV Park, we found ourselves dismantling for the trip home. The long leisurely hours I’d imagined sitting around reading and doing nothing dissipated before ever materializing. Where did they go? It’s like they were sucked into a black hole before I had a chance to enjoy them.

On the trip home, we spent six hours pulled over on the shoulder of a busy highway waiting for help to arrive to repair two blown trailer tires, another couple of hours in the lovely confines of a tire repair shop, and an extra night away from home.

There’s a mound of dirty, sandy laundry sitting in front of the washer.

There is nothing to eat or drink in the house so a serious shopping trip is sorely needed.

Though most of the contents of a plastic bag full of mail will go directly into the trash, we still have to wade through it.

My ‘to do’ list, neglected for a week, now looks more like a novella than a list.

It’ll take days to catch up on the missed posts of my favorite bloggers, read and respond to email, and return phone calls.

To me, vacation is an invitation to eat and drink whatever I want. Now that it’s over, I wish I’d shown a little restraint. At my age, extra pounds adhere to my body like they were attached with super glue. Like a tacky souvenir, I’ll be reminded of my folly on a daily basis.

My muse obviously took a separate and extended vacation. She has me wondering if I’ll ever see her again.

So as I struggle to catch up and get back into my writing routine, I’m trying hard to convince myself that T.S. Eliot knew what he was talking about and that the time I wasted last week was really worth it.

Here’s a travel advisory for anyone heading to the Saint Augustine, Florida, area: I drank from the Fountain of Youth—it doesn’t work.

What do you think—are vacations worth it?

Thanks for stopping by.


Tags: T. S. Eliot, vacation, muse, guilt, travel advisory, Saint Augustine, Fountain of Youth,

Lessons Learned From a Toddler

“Imagination is more important than knowledge.” - Albert Einstein

The past week my life has been topsy-turvy. My imagination has been boosted into overdrive. My written words are short and appear in bursts of colors. I’ve read the same several dozen books over and over again. This creative surge has nothing to do with my current projects. I didn’t discover some super pill or eat a magic mushroom. My husband and I have simply spent the past 5 days with my 2 ½ year old grandson while his parents are away.

I see him frequently because they live nearby. But regular visits can’t compare to the exhausting responsibility of being a round-the-clock caregiver. I keep reminding myself, I’d done this before and survived. My grown daughter and said grandson are my proof.

Though I can’t remember the last time I felt this tired, and my normal routine is way out of whack, it’s been a fabulous experience because he’s reminded me about the important things in life. Such as:

It’s perfectly fine to burst out into a song in the middle of the grocery store, if the mood strikes.

Getting down on your hands and knees to look at a bug crawling in the driveway provides a whole new perspective to the world. The expectation of a reply to the question, “Where’s he going?” can act as a verbal writing prompt.

Sometimes you should stop everything you’re doing to spin in circles in the living room for no particular reason.

The most important use of a dining room table is to make a tent. Forts can be made out of any available materials.

It’s possible to travel in space, back in time, to the beach, or to undiscovered lands without leaving your bedroom.

Stuffed animals and other inanimate objects have a distinctive voice of their own and love to say what they’re thinking.

Kissing an owie and then placing a Dora or Diego Band-Aid on the spot really does make the hurt go away.

Crayons make great rocket ships.

An entire house can become the Village of Sodor for Thomas the Tank Engine and Friends.

I’m confident now, that the next time I come up against the brick wall of writer’s block or my muse goes on an unplanned hiatus, I won’t panic as I’ve done in the past. Instead, I’ll simply sit back and try to look at the world through the eyes of a child.

Thanks for stopping by.

Tags: Einstein, Toddler, Imagination, writer’s block, muse,

Muse Amusement

“Spend time every day listening to what your muse is trying to tell you.” –Saint Bartholomew

A muse is the real or imaginary person a writer considers responsible for their inspirations. Most of our modern day muses still come from the nine muses of Greek Mythology: Calliope, Euterpe, Clio, Melpomene, Thalia, Terpsichore, Erato, Urania and Polyhymnia. Together they are supposedly infinite sources of wisdom and creativity. Holding a wax tablet and stylus, Calliope is probably the one most poets, writers or storytellers draw upon.

Stephen King in his book On Writing, says of his muse, “…the guy with the cigar and the little wings has got a bag of magic.”

This made me think that instead of a generic or Greek muse, I, like Stephen King, needed a more personal one. If I could visualize her, then possibly I’d be able to successfully call upon her more frequently. I had fun with the idea. I named my muse Metteccup, derived from the first letter of the names of the original nine muses. I defined her name as meaning ‘metaphysical cup.’ I’m using the archaic definition of metaphysical which, according to Dictionary. com, is: imaginary or fanciful.

I picture her as an elderly Tinkerbelle type character whose pink tutu is a stretched a bit tight around the middle and slightly frayed around the edges. She has a rosy completion, laugh lines around her sparkling dark eyes, a ski-slope kind of nose and a Mona Lisa type of smile. But don’t let her looks fool you. She can be very mischievous and has, at times, vanished for days.

However, when I’m on her good side and she uses her magic wand to shower me with cupfuls of imaginary and fanciful ideas, I wonder how I ever managed to write a word without her. I have no idea how a psychiatrist may interpret my use of an imaginary muse, but I’m almost certain that since she’s come into my life, my writing has improved.

Do you have a real or imaginary muse? If imaginary, how would you describe him, her or it?

Thanks for stopping by.

Tags: Stephen King, On Writing, Muse, Calliope, Saint Bartholomew, mythology,