Vacation! 5 Days in DC, 3 at the shore

By Caitlin Kelly

Our first long break since March 2021, which was five days upstate.

We drove south from NY, about 4.5 hours, and treated ourselves to a stay at The Willard, which opened in 1818 — the place where Martin Luther King wrote his “I have a dream” speech and where Julia Ward Howe wrote The Battle Hymn of the Republic.

Name anyone powerful in politics here and they’ve stayed or visited — the White House is a few blocks further down Pennsylvania Avenue.

It is classic old-school elegance, and our room was large and quiet.

We arrived in time for Sunday afternoon tea. What a treat! Every table was filled with people, mostly women, dressed up in their best — one table full of women wearing THE BEST HATS.

We are terrible tourists! I am never one to rush around filling my days with seeing all the official sights.

The first day I visited a favorite shop, Goodwood, in business since 1994, an eclectic mix of clothing, accessories, lighting and furniture. A block away is a fun restaurant, Ted’s Bulletin, (the 14th Street location) where I sat at the counter for lunch — repeating both times a pleasure I discovered on my last solo visit there, in March 2020, just as COVID started destroying such simple amusements as travel and eating out.

I was advised to visit the Phillips Collection and whew! It’s now one of my favorite museums anywhere, a collection of art from Renoir and Degas and van Gogh to Rothko, Diebenkorn, Klee, Kandinsky — all set within a huge old mansion. Its courtyard is also very beautiful. The staff are really welcoming and the gift store excellent. I loved the current exhibition of work by Black artist David Driskell, whose work I had never seen.

We had a long great lunch at Le Diplomate with our dear friend and ex NYT photographer Steven Crowley.

We returned — for Jose’s birthday — to one of his old haunts, the jazz club Blues Alley, for the second show. Jose lived in D.C. for eight years as a New York Times photographer, having realized his dream of becoming a member of the White House Press Corps, covering Reagan, Bush and Clinton.

Another day, Jose got his NYT staff pal Doug Mills — too busy to meet for coffee since he covers The President and all his doings — outside the White House for a quick hello. He gave us these M and Ms candies, fresh from Air Force One.

I spent a day antiquing with a very dear friend, one of our rituals, and found a homespun coverlet in pristine condition. It was such a perfect mix of new sights and discoveries, renewing some of our oldest and deepest friendships, enjoying a luxurious hotel. The weather was perfect every day, a bit cool in the evenings and sunny and (not D.C. humid) in the daytime.

We loved our meal at Jaleo, a tapas restaurant.

I was sorry not to have seen more art, as we had planned, but it was just so good to finally see our friends — Jose also caught up with another former NYT colleague.

We then drove 90 minutes east to coastal Maryland and are in Easton for three days, off to a Maritime Museum tomorrow.

It has been a wonderful and badly needed break.

We’re ready to head home and dive back into work, refreshed,

So glad of a badly needed break!

A newly renovated restaurant became our hangout. Great breakfasts!

By Caitlin Kelly

Poor Jose hadn’t unchained himself from the computer in a year.

My last break, three solo days in Pennsylvania, was in October, but I unwittingly landed (!) in Trump country before the election and cut short my holiday to head home.

So we were overdue for a chance to flee our one-bedroom apartment where — like so many of you — we’ve been working for a year.

Although we are both full-time freelance, which means no one gives us paid time off, we know we need it every bit as much as those who have salaries and paid holidays and paid vacation. We have to self-fund every minute we’re not working but without it, burnout and resentment looms! In a non-pandemic year, we would normally have already visited my native Canada a few times (by car) and probably gone to Europe or planned a trip there.

So the easiest option was to stay in-state and go back to a place we tried for a few days last summer and enjoyed.

We drove 90 minutes north to the town of Woodstock, NY, pop. 6,000, something of a hippie haven, with lots of shops selling tie-dye T-shirts and esoteric books. But also nestled in the Catskill mountains and we have two good pals who live up there who each met us for an an overdue catch-up.

The tower of Woodstock Town Hall, reflected in early wavy glass of the apothecary across the street

We stayed at a funky 1950s era motel that’s since been renovated and this time splurged on a large room that backed onto a rushing creek. Such a soothing sound!

The sky was full of stars we could actually see and we woke to lots of birdsong.

We also splurged on our first massages in a year (everyone masked) and ohhhhhhh, such sore muscles!

I slept 12 hours one night and only made it up to 11:00 p.m. one night, watching a favorite old (1981) movie on my laptop, Time Bandits.

Built in 1860 for painter Frederick Church, Olana is amazing. The interior is closed for now so I walked the grounds with two local friends.

The Catskill Mountains, seen from Olana, facing west

I took my ice skates and made a reservation to use them but instead just enjoyed a long lazy morning reading and savoring the sunshine and silence and the very high cathedral ceiling of our room (our mid 1960s apartment has 8-foot ceilings.)

We had a couple of good meals.

We each bought a pair of Blunnies, Blundstone pull-on boots I had long coveted.

I bought a bright and pretty spring-like coverlet for the bed.

I read some magazines that have been sitting around for a few months for which I rarely seem to have attention.

We loved the croissants and muffins and breads from Bread Alone, a somewhat legendary New York bakery.

It was good to sit still and stare at the woods.

It was good to be out of the apartment and our town.

It was good to not watch TV for five nights, for a badly needed change.

It was good to come home, once more, with a large shopping bag full of new books.

It was good to take some photos at sunrise, wandering a quiet town.

We came home feeling gratefully re-charged.

Work? Play? How much of each?

An amazing panel of journalists discussing the prevalence of distorted/false news

By Caitlin Kelly

An interesting piece, and book review, from The Atlantic:

Even the present-oriented hunter-gatherers, it turns out, had to develop communal strategies to quash the drivers of overwork—status envy, inequality, deprivation. When a Ju/’hoan hunter returned with a big kill, the tribe perceived a danger that he might think his prowess elevated him above others. “We can’t accept this,” one tribesman said. “So we always speak of his meat as worthless. This way we cool his heart and make him gentle.” This practice became known among researchers as “insulting the hunter’s meat.”

It was not the only custom that aimed to discourage a destabilizing competition for status and avoid a concentration of power. The tribe also “insisted that the actual owner of the meat, the individual charged with its distribution, was not the hunter, but the person who owned the arrow that killed the animal,” Suzman writes. By rewarding the semi-random contributor of the arrow, the Ju/’hoansi kept their most talented hunters in check, in order to defend the group’s egalitarianism. A welcome result was that “the elderly, the short-sighted, the clubfooted and the lazy got a chance to be the centre of attention once in a while.”

Reading about these strategies, I felt several things at once—astonished by their ingenuity, mind-blown by the notion of ridiculing exceptional achievements, and worried that my failure to imagine taking comparable pains to protect leisurely harmony meant that my own brain had been addled by too many years in productivity mode, too many twitchy Sunday evenings.

I think about this a lot, as readers here know.

I’ve been working for income from my first part-time job at 15 as a lifeguard. I started writing for income at 19 and was selling my photos at the same age, sometimes from a street corner in Toronto, sometimes to the dubious tough guy old photo editors of Time Canada (sold!) and Maclean’s, Canada’s national newsweekly.

So working hard and competing for jobs and work with many others is normal.

Leisure — rhymes with pleasure! Treasure! Not so much.

Living in hyper-competitive, expensive New York/the U.S. makes rest problematic —- many workers don’t even get paid sick days or vacation days. Freelancers like me and Jose only earn income when we work. Social media makes an ongoing performative fetish of productivity (truly a word and idea I loathe!), never legacy or creativity or beauty.

Some people have wisely created passive income streams (like owning and renting out property) but that’s always intimidated me.

I lived to age 30 in Canada, and in Toronto, an intensely work-focused place. I moved at 30 to Montreal to escape all of it, choosing a regional newspaper much less prestigious (and less competitive) than the Globe & Mail.

I was burning out and I knew it.

The balance between work and rest, ambition and chilling out, climbing a career ladder or even stepping off it is an ongoing challenge. Americans, especially, are taught from earliest childhood to compete really hard and then to work really hard.

Then….die.

I very rarely see anyone legitimately exhort them to slow down, rest, recharge!

I’m nearing the end of my career in the next few years, really not sure when or how to stop. We are OK for retirement income.

Work has been my identity for a long, long time! Journalism, at its best, can do tremendous good — righting wrongs, taking the corrupt and lying powerful to account, sharing stories that help people improve their lives. I love being part of that.

And, I have to admit, it’s a thrill to produce work published to enormous global audiences.

The larger questions yet to be resolved without work are what sometimes are the basics of a good job/career — your tribe, the people with whom, if you’re lucky, you share values and ethics, in-jokes, jargon, institutional memory.

I’ve never been a joiner or club sort of person. Same with Jose. I need a lot of intellectual stimulation to not be really bored. Neither of us has hobbies — likely the inevitable result of being too work-focused since the age of 19!

Nor, like most of our peers, do we have children or grandchildren.

So we’ll see.

How’s your summer going?

 

By Caitlin Kelly

How did it get to be August already?!

But here we are.

Have you been enjoying yours? Did you take any time off? Travel?

June is my birthday month, so we always plan something fun. We flew to Jose’s hometown of Santa Fe for eight perfect days, and really splurged. We got first class airline tickets, and that’s it. My future life! (I wish.)

 

 

We stayed four days with friends then enjoyed a comfortable and quiet hotel room a few blocks from downtown, ate great good, saw friends, played a round of golf. I haven’t been that relaxed in a long, long time. It was bliss!

July has been the usual frenzy of seeking and completing freelance work for a variety of people — nbcnews.com, a blog post for branded content, three short pieces for a magazine focused on hemophilia, for which I got to interview a UK cyclist who’d just finished the Tour de France. That was fun!

I’ve committed to a major reporting project that takes us north to Canada on the 31st for a few weeks. I can’t say more until it’s published but am really excited to finally once more tackle a serious, challenging story. I enjoy my work, but writing 300 words or 500 words or even 1,000 words barely scratches the surface of most issues.

This story proposal was rejected by at least six other places, so it’s also a relief to have found a good home for it.

And Jose is coming with me! We have never really worked together, so that’s exciting.

Fun this summer has included enjoying afternoons — usually 3pm to 5:30 — at our building’s swimming pool and lots of time on our balcony IDing bird calls and the many many flights overhead, using FlightRadar24.

For aviation geeks like us — living beneath the flight paths to four New York City/area airports: Westchester, NY; Newark, JFK and Laguardia — it’s a lot of fun to see who’s up there and in what aircraft and where they’re headed.

 

Love our sunsets!

 

We’re on the top floor, so it’s lovely and private at treetop level, still with a bit of Hudson River view.

I tend to avoid New York City all summer — too hot, humid, smelly and crowded — with too many days of delayed subway service. Hell is standing on a super-jammed platform drenched in sweat with no ventilation. I’ve ventured in a few times for work and play.

This coming week I’ll visit Boscobel to see Into the Woods, a musical, for the first time. Looking forward to it!

We still have a few months to enjoy our town’s lively Saturday morning farmer’s market, complete with live music, and on the steamiest days I flee to our gorgeous town library, with its tall ceilings, silence and very good air conditioning! They even have private conference rooms so I can do phone interviews as well.

 

What fun have you been up to?

 

A fab week in Santa Fe, NM

 

By Caitlin Kelly

It had been 20 years since my last visit — a 10-day trip with my husband Jose, then a very new boyfriend eager to show off his hometown. His late father was the minister of a small downtown Baptist church and he regaled me with happy memories of riding his bike down Johnson Street, where the Georgia O’Keefe Museum now houses her artwork in the shell of that original adobe building.

Santa Fe has a low, intimate building scale, since most buildings are made of brown adobe — curved, smooth, rounded forms made from a mixture of straw and earth, a visual uniformity unique to this small and ancient city.

Santa Fe is the state capital, founded in 1610, at 7,199 feet altitude, the oldest state capital, and the highest, in the U.S. — the 2012 census puts its population at 69,204.

It draws many tourists and celebrities; Game of Thrones author, and local, George R.R. Martin donated $1 million to create the arts center Meow Wolf.

On this visit, we stayed the first four days with one of Jose’s oldest friends, then at the Hilton, whose public spaces are filled with beautiful, large-scale original art, the city center a two or three block stroll away.

One weird caveat — the city has no taxis! There is a car service but $30 (!) is a fortune to travel a few blocks. I do not use Uber or Lyft and both are available.

Also, NB: the city’s altitude and strong sun mean plenty of water and sunscreen.

 

Some highlights:

 

Shopping

 

 

I love Mexican embroidery!

I love Santa Fe style — elegant bohemian — a look more difficult to find at home in New York, where the official color is black. There is a lot of tie-dye and embroidery and insane amounts of Native American jewelry on offer, but if you like ethnic textiles from places like India, Mexico, Laos and Guatemala, you will find a lot of choice.

The city attracts some very wealthy visitors and homeowners, so some prices are eye-watering, but there are more moderate offerings:

Passementrie is a treasure trove if you, like me, love textiles — cotton, silk, linen, in pillow covers, throws, scarves and clothing.

 

A selection of cowboy boots at Nathalie

 

Nathalie, on Canyon Road, has been in business since 1995, owned and run by its namesake, a former French Vogue editor, bien sur! A stylish mix of clothing, cowboy boots, antique and new home objects.

 

Spirit, downtown, is amazing, but spendy-y, as is Corsini, the men’s store next to it. But a great selection of floaty dresses, knitted leather handbags, basic T-shirts, wallets, jewelry. The men’s store has gorgeous cotton jeans in all those weathered Southwestern colors, $225 a pair.

 

Check out all the local food offerings to take home, from blue corn for pancakes to chile powder to posole.

 

Every day, local natives bring their handmade silver and copper jewelry for sale in front of the Palace of the Governors. Lots of choices! Many local stores also sell native jewelry, both current and vintage; Ortega’s has a huge selection.

 

If you’re interested in pottery and contemporary art, wander along Canyon Road, lined with galleries.

 

Collected Works is a fantastic 40-year-old indie bookstore with a cafe attached.

 

Act 2 is a consignment shop on Paseo de Peralta, with a wide selection of women’s clothes, shoes, accessories — including sizes large and extra-large. Not the Chanel-Gucci kind of store but lots of linen and cotton. I scored two handbags and a linen shirt.

Dining

 

Such great food!

 

La Choza

A classic since 1983, ever popular, in the Railyard neighborhood. We ate there twice: lots of margaritas and Southwestern food like frito pie (ground meat and trimmings), chalupas, enchiladas and served in a former adobe home.

 

 

 

 

 

Cafe Pasqual’s

With only 50 seats, bright green wooden chairs and Mexican tiled walls, this cafe offers a long menu and delicious food, from breakfast on.

 

Izanami

This was one of the best meals I’ve eaten anywhere, sort of Japanese tapas, with a huge choice of sake and wine. The dining room is beautiful and the deck offers fantastic views of the wooded canyon. We ate soba noodles, shrimp and oyster tempura, asparagus tempura, pork ribs and gyoza, plus a glass of red wine and one of sake; $105. This is the restaurant at Ten Thousand Waves, out of town, so you’ll need a car to get there.

The Teahouse

This lovely restaurant on Canyon Road serves food all day and has an amazingly long list of teas, hot or iced. The quiet and intimate rooms are filled with black and white photos or you can sit outside under an umbrella in the shade.

Day Trips

 

 

Ten Thousand Waves is a must! This spa, lodging, restaurant combination has been in business since 1981, Japanese in design. Private hot tubs, massages and dinner available. A few caveats: the women’s locker room is cramped, with only 2 showers and one toilet, while the place is very busy. It’s also at the top of a steep hill and I saw no access for those with mobility issues. The massages were excellent as was the private hot tub.

Taos

A 90-minute drive north into rugged countryside. Much smaller and quieter than Santa Fe. Worth it! Population 5,668.

 

The Santuario

 

Chimayo

There are two reasons to make the drive, the gorgeous early Mission church, the Santuario de Chimayo (built 1813 to 1816) and the 50-year-old restaurant Rancho de Chimayo, with delicious food, shaded patios and very reasonable prices. Their sopaipillas are heavenly — and don’t forget to dip them in the pot of honey on the table; they come with almost every meal.

Los Alamos

Where the atomic bomb was developed!

Santa Fe National Forest

A short drive from town, this thick forest of pine and aspen has picnic sites, campsites and hiking trails.

Valles Caldera

Gorgeous! I’m doing tbe next blog post about this National Park, a 57 mile drive northwest of Santa Fe.

 

 

Taking a breather

 

By Caitlin Kelly

People fantasize about freelance life — no boss! no meetings! no cubicle! no commute!

All true.

Also — no steady income! no security! no workday!

One great pleasure, though, is disappearing when we can find the time and money to do so.

So we’re off to Jose’s hometown, Santa Fe, New Mexico, my first visit there in 20 years, right after we met.

We’ll visit childhood friends, hike, get a massage at 10,000 Waves, play golf.

Relax.

Jose just finished photo editing for the U.S. Open, held in Pebble Beach, California — sitting in the hallway of our one-bedroom New York apartment. His workday stretched from 7:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m. for a solid week. I don’t know where he gets the stamina!

I’ve spent the past week pitching a lot of stories, all of them to new-to-me markets, and now await (I hope) a few assignments to come back to.

In American life, workers feel lucky to even get two weeks’ paid vacation, while Europeans are accustomed to five. Working freelance, we generally take five or six weeks, although three-at-once is the most we can do because of Jose’s work.

So ready to recharge!

What’s your ideal vacation?

For so many NYC visitors, Broadway!

 

By Caitlin Kelly

I know, I know — it might be any vacation at all!

Americans are pathetically deprived, certainly compared to European nations — French workers enjoying five paid weeks off — and even those who have earned paid time off are often too broke, too tired or scared to even use it.

One of the things I enjoy most about freelance work is taking as much time off, as often, as we can afford.

I have eclectic taste when it comes to taking a break. In Santa Fe, I’ll be seeing (!) my first rodeo and can’t wait — and will return, decades later, to the legendary spa Ten Thousand Waves. I love a mix of rustic and elegant, day hikes or horseback riding or canoeing or golf (outdoor activity) with dressing nicely for dinner and enjoying a good meal.

Since we live in a suburb and drive wayyyyyy too much, my preferred holidays put me or us down in one spot (hotel, usually) for at least 3 or 4 days, maybe longer, and we walk, take cabs or use public transit.

 

Some of my favorites:

 

–— A cross-country train trip in 2003 from Chicago to Seattle and all the way back to New York again. I think everyone should make this trip once to truly see the countryside and appreciate its incredible beauty and diversity. I loved this experience.

 

 

— A week in the small coastal Croatian town of Rovinj, in July 2017, which I discovered thanks to the recommendation of a travel blogger in Berlin and this blog post.  I don’t normally trust all blogging advice on travel, but had read enough of Dorothée’s work to know she and I have similar tastes. Rovinj is called Little Venice and its old town is spectacular, with its silken marble cobblestones and plunge pools at the edge of the Adriatic.

 

 

— A tiny northern Thai town, Mae Hong Son, although I loved every moment of my 21 days in Thailand. Gorgeous landscapes, safe alone as a woman traveler, delicious food.

 

Jose went to the local barber, ex-boxer Patrick Quinn. His haircut was 5 euros.

 

I loved seeing these gorgeous shawls in Dublin — so much better to take a photograph than buy and regret…

 

---

 

— Ireland. Just such a welcoming place, bursting with beauty and history and kind people. I’ve been five times so far and loved all of it.

 

— France. Big place! And still so much of it to see. I’ve visited and loved: Paris, (lived there for a year), Normandy, Brittany, the Cote D’Azur (the south of France, multiple visits), Perpignan, the Loire Valley, the Camargue (pink flamingos! cowboys!) and (the best), Corsica. I wept as the tiny commuter plane left Bastia for Nice; my week there, traveling alone by mo-ped, remains one of my happiest memories ever.

 

Cafe life!

 

— Tanzania and Kenya, safari. Only possible thanks to an inheritance in my mid-20s, as these tend to be pricey, plus airfare. But every second was unforgettable. Truly worth every penny.

 

— Los Angeles. Yes, really. I had so much fun! I rode horseback at sunset through Griffith Park and then danced to live blues at Harvelle’s, a fantastic club in business since 1931. I loved discovering different neighborhoods and took a great architectural tour in the back of a vintage black Cadillac.

Some of the many places I still want to visit:

— Japan, Morocco, Greece, Bosnia, Botswana/South Africa/Namibia, Patagonia, coastal Brazil, an Amazon river cruise, a 2-3 week drive through California.

–re-visit Italy, Croatia, England, France.

 

What are some of your best vacation memories?

What’s your ideal vacation?

Taking a needed breather

 

Time for a break!

 

By Caitlin Kelly

Luckily, I have good friends in Toronto willing to host me for a week, and I’ve been enjoying time away from the endless toxicity of American politics, work and health issues.

Late summer is a good time to visit this city, as winter can be bitter and midwinter days depressingly gray. (My husband, Jose, is busy right now photo editing the U.S. Open Tennis, ending his work shift as late as 1 or even 2:00 a.m. after the final evening match.)

I arrived here bringing champagne and chocolate and books. I try hard to be a low-maintenance guest, since we have often hosted friends in our one-bedroom, one-bathroom apartment, and I know it can feel overwhelming. My friends have a large enough house we can all disappear when needed — and one sign of a good friendship is the ability to do so, and no one feels offended, since everyone needs quiet time alone.

I grew up in Toronto, ages five to 30, so I still have many deep friendships and lots of memories here — I usually return once or twice a year, the last time in April with Jose.

This visit I shared a friend’s 70th birthday celebrations, caught up with five more of my friends and just enjoyed some badly needed downtime; (several more local pals were posting FB photos of their trips to Paris and Prague.)

Like most of my visits, it was filled with reminders of my history here. One of the party guests knew me as a baby (!) and hadn’t seen me since. Another knew me from fifth grade at a Toronto girls’ school. And I worked with yet another at Canadian Press — in January 1982.

I slept in, visited with my hosts and binge-watched The Alienist. Shopped at my favorite store, Gravity Pope. Ate a few good meals.

What a gift to detach from work and all things medical for a while!

A few images…

 

Every Toronto summer ends with the Canadian National Exhibition, aka The Ex, which closes on Labor Day. I hadn’t been in about eight or nine years, met a good friend there and wandered. But it’s gotten stupidly expensive ($20 admission alone) and too commercial for my taste.

 

My friend’s party had such delicious food — ribs and salmon and corn and caprese salad and lots of wine and this amazing pavlova for dessert, made by one of his daughters. Yum!

 

It’s trendy as hell, but a good spot for a cold beer and lunch on a scorchingly hot day.

 

I’m total and unrepentant fan of all things aviation related, so the CNE air show was so so so cool!  It was a little terrifying to hear the thundering of jets flying low over downtown, but what skills!

Do you live to work — or work to live?

Do you ever just STOP and take a breather?

 

By Caitlin Kelly

This recent blog post by a good friend — an American living in London — once more reminded me of what I value most…time away from the grind of work:

Last September Jeff and I spent a week in Greece and it was one of the most relaxing and restorative breaks I’ve ever taken in my life. It may be a silly thing to say about a fairly standard holiday, but it felt like a profound experience at the time. I needed it badly, felt great after I got back, and the sense of refreshment stayed with me a long time. When I was back in London I was emotional balanced, better at my work, and much better equipped to handle the flow of projects. We were in our 30s and this was the first holiday Jeff and I had ever taken that didn’t involve family or friends of some kind. There was no agenda, no purpose to the trip except to press pause on life for a moment and the positive effect of doing so was intense.

And then, like an idiot, I waited nearly a year to take significant time off again. It showed. I was getting anxious and overwhelmed by things that would not have phased me in a more rested state.

It’s not easy to take a proper holiday when you live far away from your family, losing a day each way to travel, (driving or flights, usually), plus cost.

You only get so many paid vacation days and then…they’re gone!

It’s also difficult if you’re burdened with debt, have multiple children and/or a very tight budget.

 

A holiday doesn’t have to be luxurious, but it does mean time for farniente — literally do nothing.

 

Relaxing.

People like Jose and I work freelance, which means that every day we don’t work we don’t get paid — and our bills don’t magically drop in size and volume. (Our health insurance alone is $1,400 every month, more than our mortgage payment.)

Even so, I usually take at least six weeks every year to not work, even if it’s just sitting at home.

American work culture isn’t as bad as Japan’s where karoshi — death from overwork — is real. But its savage demands of low wages, a thin social safety net, precarious employment, almost no unions — plus the insane costs of a university education — combine to keep too many Americans working with few breaks.

And —  how dare you look “unproductive”?!

Here’s my whip-smart pal Helaine Olen, writing on this in the Washington Post:

The United States is, famously, the only First World country that does not mandate employers give employees paid time off. (That includes Christmas and Thanksgiving.) In Canada and Japan, workers must receive at least 10 paid vacation days, and the Canadians also enjoy a number of paid official holidays. The European Union mandates all employees receive 20 days off annually — and that also does not include paid holidays. But in the United States? Nothing.

Instead, the wealthiest among us boast of their work habits — both Rupert Murdoch and Ivanka Trump (before her recent work-life family balance makeover) bragged that they would stop in their offices on Sundays to encourage their workers to do the same. Sheryl Sandberg urged women to lean in by going home and having dinner with the kids — and then signing back on the computer to catch up. At the same time, we all but demonize those who don’t have employment or can’t get by on what they earn.

I still enjoy writing, but I’ve been doing it for a living for decades and no longer seek the career-boosting thrill of a Big Magazine byline.

I’d love to write a few more books, but this year has been dis-spiriting — both of my book proposals, (which cost unpaid time to produce), have each been rejected by more than three agents. Not sure if I’ll keep trying with the second one.

 

Do you work to live or live to work?

 

Has that changed for you over time?

Take a break!

 

By Caitlin Kelly

I know, for some of you — parents, caregivers, those on super-tight budgets, in school — that’s not easy to do.

2018 did not begin well for me — the first time in many years I earned no income at all from my freelance work, for two months.

And our fixed monthly living costs, even without children or debt, are more than $5,000 a month, so no income from my side meant digging into our savings. (Which we are lucky to have!)

Burned out, I recently took a two-week break, and that cost us even more lost income and savings, in hotel/gas/meals, for 2 weeks back in Ontario, where I grew up and have many friends. (A last-minute change of plans meant our free dog-sitting housing fell through.)

The “freedom” of freelance work also means that every minute we’re not working, we lose income. No paid vacation days for us!

But oh, I needed some time off, and so did my weary full-time freelance husband Jose, a photo editor.

We didn’t do very much: napped, read magazines and books, had some very good meals, enjoyed long evenings with old friends, took photos, hit some golf balls at the driving range. Visited with my Dad, who lives alone and who turns 89 in June.

I was burned out and deeply frustrated by endless rejections and some nasty encounters. Fed up!

I came home renewed, and have been pitching up a storm of fresh ideas and projects, trying for some new and much more ambitious targets. I’ve also been asking others for more help achieving some of my goals than I used to — doing everything alone is exhausting and demoralizing.  (It’s really interesting to see who follows through, generously, and who — for all their very public social media all about how they believe deeply in mentorship — won’t lift a finger.)

In a country, (the U.S., where I live) and state (New York) where costs are so high and many people work insane hours, it’s counter-cultural to even admit to wanting a break, let alone taking one.

Not a glamorous brag-worthy Insta-perfect exotic and foreign vacation.

No poolside fruity drinks with little umbrellas in them.

Just a break.

I’m really glad that we did.

 

Are you able to carve out time to recharge?

 

Daily? Weekly? Every few months?

 

 

What do you do to re-energize?