Why don’t adults get a time out?
There is more to life than increasing its speed. ~ Gandhi
I need a time-out.
Kids get them all the time; why can’t adults?
Of course, kids get them for all the wrong reasons. I think we, as adults, should have the freedom to call one for the right reasons.
First of all, it’s summer. It’s almost as if time’s clock hits the pause button as June begins a three month sabbatical from the normal. Although there’s no official classroom for me, I still watch as kids get off the bus for the last time this school year and remember that same feeling of freedom. I did a jig as I crossed in front of the bus and headed toward my front door, knowing full well that mama’s summer calendar would keep me busier than any teacher’s would. But I was home, and I could exhale.
And summer also meant nights under the stars, lightning bugs in jars, days spent on the lake, creamed corn with plump red juicy tomatoes, peach picking and pickling, helping daddy plow and harvest the garden, church picnics and girlfriend sleep-overs. It is exhausting remembering how busy I was, but no one said growing up was ever easy. However, it wasn’t the kind of busy you dreaded like the usual Friday spelling test in Mrs. Smith’s class.
Today, those moments still exist, but by the time I hit the summer season, I’m too busy to set duties aside and enjoy these flashes of time. As responsibilities pile up and jobs increase, I rarely give myself permission to stop the cycle of life. Just stop. People are so conditioned to believe that the more you do, the taller you stack your plate and the longer your ‘to do’ list becomes, the more successful you are and will be.
Not quite, I’m afraid. However, I do think it makes you miserable.
So I think that’s the power and the gift of summer—the granting of permission to stop the routine; and if you can’t halt your world for these three months, at least slow down.
