Snow Days and Hotel Stays
Wednesday, February 2nd, 2011Once upon a time I was a traveling salesman (woman). A sales rep for a medical software company, I peddled my wares across the upper Midwest for two years. I flew out on Monday mornings, and back on Thursdays, usually with a quick stopover at home on Tuesday nights for MBA classes. There is a lot about those two years that I don’t miss. The life of a frequent flyer is filled with headaches. Time away from home and husband were draining. Add part time graduate school to a full time job with regular travel and in retrospect I often wonder how I did it. (I didn’t have kids then, is the answer.)
There was one thing I did love about all that time away, though: forced relaxation. When you are in a hotel in Bismarck, North Dakota your to-do list is rendered irrelevant. It doesn’t matter if your floors need sweeping, if you need to go to the grocery store, or if a thousand other things are hanging over your head. When you are alone in a hotel in Bismarck (or Omaha or Dubuque or Oshkosh) there is not much option but to sit back and relax.
Yesterday was a similar day for us here in the Midwest. We got ice overnight on Monday and it sleeted throughout the day on Tuesday. My office was closed. GAP’s office was closed. Nanny stayed home. And while there was regular checking of e-mail and the odd follow-up phone call, the day was, for the most part, quiet.
I do my best not to lead a life that is forever harried by an unending list of commitments and obligations. But no amount of effort can fully compensate for the fact that the life of a working mother is a busy one. If I want to pursue my career, be involved in my son’s life, devote time to my husband, and still have time for friends and hobbies the sacrifice that I make is my quiet time. I don’t regret the way I’ve ranked these priorities, but I still appreciate the moments when unforeseen logistics step in and upend my little equilibrium, giving me fallow periods that I don’t usually get to enjoy. There is value to quiet time, and it’s easy to lose sight of that when you’ve forgotten what it is that you’re missing.
When Anne and I were kids quiet time was a regular part of our day. During the summers when we were too old to nap, but too young to go a full day without my mother needing a break we had “quiet time” every afternoon. Mom went back to her room to read or write or nap. And Anne and I were also assigned to our respective rooms. There was no agenda. We could read. We could sleep. We could play with toys. The only rules were that we couldn’t play together, we couldn’t leave our rooms, and we couldn’t bother Mom for an hour.
As I remember it I wasn’t a huge fan of quiet time. I was an active and energetic kid and I imagine I found it boring. But as an adult I see it in a different light. One obvious benefit was that it gave my mother respite from my sister’s and my antics. But more importantly it was the beginning of learning how to be alone. It was when I first learned the value of pace and patience. It was when I learned to stimulate my own mind without the influence of other people. In retrospect I realize that it was an incredible gift.
I mentioned the other day that I’m reading The Not So Big Life by Sarah Susanka. I’m not through it yet, so I can’t say where it will take me. But I sense that it’s leading me down a path that will empower me to identify these aspects of my life that I value, but yet have somehow sacrificed (like quiet time). And I hope that it will also help me better understand how to recalibrate my life to make room for these things, and perhaps trim away aspects of my life that have been improperly prioritized.
Perhaps one day I will look at my life and find it perfectly balanced. In the meantime, though, I will relish in the snow days and hotel stays that force me to downshift a couple of gears.