Vacation?

What constitutes a vacation?

The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines it as “a period of time that a person spends away from home, school, or business usually in order to relax or travel.”

So, basically, the last 4 days that I spent in Arizona would be, by definition, a vacation. But honestly, now that I’m sitting here back home, the last few days didn’t feel much like a vacation. Four days, 2 of which were travel days, left only 2 days with 3 kids and a whole lot of whining and complaining. Sheesh… kids don’t appreciate anything.

Not that this was a revelation. We’ve traveled with them before and to even farther away places. Still… when you only have 4 days over the entire summer to go away… it almost doesn’t seem worth it.

Getting out of Los Angeles was great, but missing the dogs wasn’t. Not having to cook a meal was great, but arguing over where we’re going to eat was exhausting. Lauryn wanted to swim, Amanda wanted to go play miniature golf, and Temera was happy sitting in a dark room playing on her iPad. Meanwhile, I was thrilled to do nothing but lay in bed and read… while David just wanted to sleep.

In between, we had a few good meals, and a few not so great ones. The best part is that I am under no obligation at all to blog about any of it. Now THAT is the beauty of being on a real vacation… nothing was paid for, sponsored, or given in exchange for anything. We didn’t feel like we had to take photos, tweet or give shout-outs on Facebook. In fact, I barely took photos at all. I did bring my laptop, but that’s because I’m in the middle of a big campaign I’m working on and I had to be on-call. (My life in social media.) Other than some early morning emails, the rest of my days were free.

So while I wouldn’t exactly call it a vacation… I’d be fine with labeling this past weekend a “get away from home” trip. Next time maybe Hawaii… or a cruise… or someplace that I don’t have to drive to just to turn around and drive home a few days later.

Driving? Not a vacation!