We're all going on a summer holiday, sang Cliff Richard. Not us. Not really. Perhaps a few nights away visiting our more distant family members. But hardly a holiday.
My wife remembers posing the question as a girl - What are holidays for? What are you meant to do? Where to go wasn't the problem back then. It was for parents to decide. If lucky, you were simply taken..
As a boy I always knew what holidays were for. In a word - Escape. Escape from routine, especially the dreaded daily routine of school attendance. I never liked school. To wake up in the morning free of that ghastly obligation. What bliss!
But now, at my age, novelty makes me sad; leaves me asking why I have not done this, been here, before. Revisiting places and experiences, even reading again much-thumbed books, is more satisfying. In particular, since retirement from parish ministry I have nothing and nobody to escape from. My centre of gravity (and how I love gravity) is here at home.
A sober contemplation is that one day I will indeed be taken, bodily removed, from my home and the blessed company of those who share it with me, for a long, long holiday, an endless rest. Too long. Too soon.
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