Beach Reading

Current Reading: Anansi Boys, by Neil Gaiman

Inspirational Quote: "A human being is a part of the whole called by us universe, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feeling as something separated from the rest, a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty." -- Albert Einstein

I'm on vacation.

I've needed one for a while, but you know how it is... there's always some work that needs doing, and if it's to be done right, you must see to it. So for one week, I'm taking time to stretch outside the normal confines of my life and see some things that I've meant to see all along but always put off for more immediate sights.

Southern Ontario is a remarkable place. This summer more than many others. The weather is "unsettled," which means cool for July and more rainy than sunny. But the sky... beautiful layers of cloud: cirrus, cumulus, stratus lying in runs from horizon to horizon. In the evening, when the sun is high enough to fall on the tops of the lower strata and low enough to light up the bottoms of the higher strata, turning everything gold and pink and blue. Wow. We have hills and forests and the crazy broken terrain of the Canadian Shield not far from the palace. We have lakes (oh, boy do we have lakes... so many that God had to put a few on top of hills because he ran out of room anywhere else) and rivers and wetlands full of birds. It may not be the greatest place in the whole world (how would I know if I haven't seen the whole world?), but it is a great place.

Cassandra and I have been walking in parks a lot, conservation areas and provincial parks and just about any other place we can find when we have time. It's great to spend time with her because sometimes I can see through four-year-old eyes and the world becomes, for just a moment, a far more wonderful place than my forty-three-year-old mind is allowed to imagine. It's a better rest than a few hours in bed.

Although I'm giving some thought to obtaining a hammock because a few hours in bed out under the sky should never be considered a bad thing.

Just a reminder: sometimes the most important thing we can do for others is take some time for ourselves. Everything we do for others, for work, for family, for friends, takes energy and time. If we don't set aside time for ourselves, to relax and recharge, we'll soon have nothing left to give anyone.

So, here's to a few days off.