Time Away Will Do That

How time away changes us

The following post is part of a Seed Pod collaboration about time. Seed Pods are a SmallStack community project designed to help smaller publications lift each other up by publishing and cross-promoting around a common theme. We’re helping each other plant the seeds for growth!

I slice the olives in half, the sharp knife cutting through green ones, then ripe ones. These will go into my sourdough bread that is bubbling away on the counter. My gestures are slow, deliberate and easy. I’m still in post-vacation mode. Last week, on a whim, Jim and I booked a campsite at our favorite provincial park along the eastern shore of Lake Superior. We packed up our teardrop camper, gathered food for our meals and supplies for our golden retriever, Sadie, and headed north for some time away.

 This was not on our calendar two weeks ago. But with the first hints of the end of summer approaching, the timing felt really right. It was only five days but those five days made a big difference in our lives. 

Our trek seven hours north of our home takes us to a place far removed from our everyday lives. We live outside in nature and follow its rhythm along with the rhythm of our bodies. We are no longer following a clock or a schedule and our work has been left behind. Instead of a yard to mow and a garden to water and weed, we sit among the pines and birches and quiet our minds. Instead of orders to fill and customers to work with, we relax in the sand with only the endless watery horizon to beckon. Instead of bills to pay and dates to remember, we hike among the twisted roots and luxuriant ferns, listening to the sound of insects. In the span of five days, we reorient ourselves to what matters: this life that we have to live in this moment.

It’s not a conscious thing that happens. It usually starts with the thought that maybe five days is too long and how will I fill my time?

But slowly, those thoughts unravel. Time no longer matters when you wake up to the cawing of crows and the rustle of leaves and the only thing calling is your bladder and the dog and that first cup of coffee. There is no need to rush. There’s only all day to slow down and take in all this place has to offer. And by the end, you’re wishing you could stay a little longer, breathe in these scents a little more, walk down the beach a little further. It’s like my mind has finally caught up with my body. And now I can go back to my “normal” life refreshed.

Time away also puts my life in perspective. I now view it from afar and more objectively. Those things that seemed enormous back home are given a back seat. Here, I’m focused on my true needs: eating, drinking, sleeping, breathing, staying warm, protecting myself from the elements. The loaf of bread that didn’t turn out, the negativity in the news, the hard to handle relationship. All of those fade beneath the beauty of the natural world, the quiet of the woods, the even laps of the water. We often use these hours to reflect on what is working in our lives and what we should move away from. From our camping chairs, we can see our daily life as a movie and stop each frame to take the good and throw away the bad.

Best of all, time away gives us a place to dream. Where do we go from here and what do we want in the future? So many of our plans started as dreams hatched while we were away from our home. In this open space, anything seems possible. So we come up with what seems impossible and, once home, we make it happen. Time away provides a place where creativity flows, unhemmed by deadlines, appearances and boundaries.

Five days seem like nothing in the span of life but five days can change my world. Taking these hours away from our day to day actually adds more than I can count to my life. 

Now, I take the lemon and grate it, add the bright and flavorful yellow zest to the olives. Then scoop it all along with herbes de Provence into the bread dough. I think about the possibilities as I fold the dough over and over. I plan as I breathe in that whiff of lemon, olive and sourdough. I see what is before me now and appreciate it fully. Time away will do that.