I have had the entire last week off. I took some days off work to make the most of the Easter bank holidays with no other plan than to immerse myself in whatever—no agenda. Just me, myself and I meandering through time and space.
Last week in my post “Pay yourself first” I wrote about one of the greatest gifts we can give to ourselves—and that is the gift of time.
While I’ve had a few weeks off work in the last year, it’s actually been a long time since I’ve had an expanse of time to enjoy with no agenda, no demands.
For the last year or so, any time I’ve had off has been spent in the company of others or else working on my home renovation. This isn’t to say any of that time wasn’t well spent—I loved every minute (ok, except when I was stripping wallpaper and sanding floors). However, it has been a while since I’ve had time off to just meander and see where things go. No major plans except to enjoy my own company and switch off.
Something I’ve learned about myself is that I need at least three or four days to switch off from work—a weekend is never enough for that. A weekend usually only ever gives us enough time to catch our breath before diving back in to the rushing flow of the work-week.
Give me four days away from the hustle, bustle and demands of the day-to-day and work thoughts drift away.
Work thoughts are things like, “Did I remember to set up that meeting?” or “Should I have said what I said in that call?” and fill-in-the-blank with any and all work-related brain murmurs. The blah blah blahs.
I did myself a favor this week and bagged a change of scenery for a few days too—I took myself to the Lake District to enjoy some peace, quiet and the outdoors. As a bonus, I found accomodation on a farm in Rosgill that had ✨no phone or internet signal.✨ My accommodation was an old static caravan situated in between a couple of old barns. It had running water, a radiator to keep warm and a hot shower. It was basic, but perfect. There were two very friendly cats that regularly came by to say hello, as well as a sheep dog that invited me to play fetch with him a couple of times; there were hens roaming about and pastures with herds of goat, sheep, cows and a couple of horses.
I arrived around 4pm on the first day, so I unpacked and took it easy whilst reading the books I brought with me.
The following morning—despite the loud rain and forecast for more rain—I dared myself to hike up Hellvellyn. It was a helluva dare, and in the end I couldn’t make it to the summit. After I had ascended around 2,400 ft. in pouring rain and penetrated through a wall of stingy sleet, I found myself trying to ascend the remaining 700 ft. climb in what at first appeared to be light patches of snow. Those patches turned out to be anything but light—they were thick and full, the ground was and icy mud-slush and the atmosphere was white and swirling with bit fat snowflakes—it was chaotic and spectacular but really difficult to make progress without my crampons. So, in favor of self-preservation, I turned back.
I truly adore a chaotic and challenging hike but I discovered a new limit up there. I’d been hiking in the snow before, but never at that altitude with a blizzard coming down—as my feet kept slipping on the way up I thought to myself, “it’s always more difficult coming down,” and I’m glad I had that thought. Coming down even the short amount I had travelled into the snow was actually quite difficult, even with my hiking poles giving some support. It felt like a real treat to be back in the pouring rain and mud after all that! I’ll be more prepared next time. Live and learn, so it goes.
The next day, the sun was shining and it wasn’t too cold out so I put my running shoes on and set off from the farm and ran over a couple of hills down to Hawswater reservoir and back. I managed a decent 10k run and then walked for a good while enjoying the sun and listening to an audiobook. I’ve been into Richard Rohr lately—he speaks to the part of me that loves some theology paired with Jungian psychology and Girardian philosophy.
In all I had three evenings on the farm with no internet. It reminded me of being at my grandmother’s house when I was a child. Her house was also on a farm, and there was no internet because it was the 1980s and 90s!
I had no idea how much I needed to be away from the internet until I was away from it 😂 It hadn’t occurred to me how often I’m looking, checking, scrolling, and responding until I had no access. It left me with a feeling that perhaps I should start obeying a day of sabbath each week and shutting everything off—no internet, no phone, no pixels, none of that.
It was there in the Lake District on a farm with no internet connection that the poetry just happened. I had nothing else to do. I had finished the two books I brought with me and had played as many games of chess on my phone as I could stand, so I pulled out my notebook and the poetry happened.
Poetry happens to me when things get really quiet. The last time poetry happened to me was during the COVID-19, 20 and 21 lockdown period. A lot of poetry happened back then.
I don’t know if it’s good or bad poetry, but it felt good—it always feels good when words just flow. Here’s a couple of poems I wrote this week:
dew drops and marigolds on loan
from Earth the pale blue dot there
holding still its sun and moon give care
and not one second goes by without its soft glowing rays
and waves non stop but flow
like a cage made of elastic particles
and articles of heather locks stillness and gravity in a continuous drop
like a spot of rain that combines and ripples
merging and expanding all at once
and another…
I sit in grief
I sit in beauty
In mud, and pain
I sit
I grow and expand
And branch and blossom
And every season bruises me
And teaches me
And I bloom
I bloom in beauty
I grow in grace
My armor gets stronger
My petals get softer
My thorns multiply
Like the things I create
They bloom and multiply
Through imitation and influence
And copies and nutrients
In souls and minds
In hearts and lungs
And tongues and the fungus
I grow and reap and repeat
And sow
And so
It goes
It goes
Complete
I wrote a couple more poems but there’s no need to share them 😂 you get the picture. Nature was clearly speaking to me out there. Getting all that time off, away and unplugged from the buzz-ping signals was a true treat.
I’ll confess, in the very end—on the last evening when I felt like I had exhausted all of my quiet-time activities and written as many poems as I could, I remembered I had a few episodes of Golden Girls saved on my iPad (something to comfort me on long flights) so I put on a few episodes and played a few games of Solitaire before bed 😌
Now I’m here writing to you, because I really enjoy writing to all of you each week. Tomorrow is a bank holiday here in the UK so I’ve got one more day to do whatever before it’s time to get back to work on Tuesday.
If you haven’t had a break recently, then I hope you get one soon. Go have some quality time with just yourself—turn things off, go outside, be with nature, finish those books, let boredom seep through you until you write some poetry or whatever suits you!
What do you get up to when you’ve had some quality time off??
As ever, thank you for joining me here again this week. I’ll write again next week x
What a great week! I’m jealous. I would love time off with no agenda.
Loved the poetry!