This summer, we took a staycation. That’s stay + vacation. As in, a trip to nowhere.
The word itself seems dangerously akin to “babymoon,” which, when I was pregnant, never rolled off my tongue without a little gag. But the staycation, in concept and in practice, did a lot toward adjusting my attitude about our botched summer getaway.
The week I had taken off work—during which a road-trip to Big Sur was in the cards—got unceremoniously hijacked by my husband having a work emergency, and half of California being on fire. Our nanny was off for the week and I couldn’t change the dates, so we were, to put it bluntly, stuck at home. But once I began to think of it as a staycation, I started to plan the puppy out like we were going overseas: I made itineraries, printed maps, booked sitters, researched day-trips, and scheduled some all-important “me-time” (in the form of spa appointments). My logic: if I put muscle into the preparation, it could be a real adventure. And if I was really organized, I could probably spend a ton of money, seriously overeat, and lose at least one pair of sunglasses, too.
I shared all this with my husband and he seemed a bit ... perplexed. Why on earth would you take a week off only to pack it full of activities? What about spontaneity? Chance? Chill out time? To which I responded that if I book us up with fun and unusual to-dos, we would be less likely to end up at the market buying cleaning products or doing any of the other mundane but necessary things we reserve for a typical weekend.
I think he rolled his eyes, but he went along with it. And, ultimately, it was just what the doctor ordered.
