If You Can, Take the Trip

 

I don't know who I am anymore. For the past five weekends in a row (FIVE IN A ROW!) I've had random travel plans, so this marks the first weekend I've been home in over a month.

Truth is, I like spending weekends at home. I really do. A weekend at home serves both as a mop-up from the prior week and a springboard into the next, a brief moment to get caught up on life, a comma in the chronology. But upon reflection, I'm quite pleased I've made these recent road trips.

Last weekend, for instance, I visited my dear friend in West Virginia. We spent all day Saturday talking, binge watching a show on Netflix, and strolling through her neighborhood between episodes. We made fajitas, ate them while sitting on the couch, and then splurged on ice cream. We discussed everything and nothing: work-life balance, parenting challenges, matters of faith, why it's so difficult to get acclimated to carrying a new bag, whether she'd win if she competed in the Amazing Race, and how I'm rethinking cardigan-wearing.

You know, all the important stuff of life.

Weekends at home are great, but I can't say that I'll remember any of them specifically. But these random travels, these actual experiences, these post-Covid moments that are beginning to feel normal again after such a long absence? These I'll remember.

If you can, take the trip.