Oh,Thou Sluggard-ing

A Day to Vegetate

Life presents many challenges throughout any given week. One may find themselves facing theft of a license plate, or dealing with a frustrating local furniture company, all while being depended on by the family and coworkers for one's sturdy frame and loyal nature. As Friday rolls around again each week, I am apt to feel like a beetle that has been tramped on by a careless hiker. Saturday and Sunday present a little free time, at least to get clear of the public for a while, but we often have a lot to attend to on those days, as well. Recently we went haring around the Southeast region to visit family in the Mississippi Delta. We got home on Sunday night and fell almost immediately into a coma-like, dreamless sleep, but it took most of the week to fully recover. By Saturday of the long Memorial Day weekend, both Micki and I understood the beetle's plight.

We Bares are doughty and strong. It is unusual for me to get so wiped out that I cannot move, but the previous weekend's journeys, combined with the workweek's unusually exhausting lists of tasks, and we were starting to feel like congealed mush. We went to bed early on Friday and didn't rise too terribly early on Saturday. I won't say that we were shiftless layabouts the whole day—there was certainly a little shifting toward dinner time—but it was close enough as makes no difference.

Under other circumstances, which is to say, when I was a bit younger, the urge to be up and doing with vim and vigor would have been hard to quash on the weekend. A good night's sleep on Friday would have energized me to no little extent. Saturday, after making breakfast, I would have been outside mowing or fixing something in the house in the case of rain. Later, perhaps, we might have gone out for supper or met friends downtown, but generally, it would have been a day where we did not let the grass grow beneath our feet.

This past weekend was an exception. It would be paltering with the truth to say that I wasn't grateful that we didn't have errands to run or people to visit. It was nice to have an entire day free of anything strenuous on the social or chore calendars. We rose late, ate breakfast in bed, puttered about a little, but generally, we just sat and relaxed; perhaps recuperate is the better word.

Guilty Resting

My own impulse to keep busy is probably partially genetic—we Bares are doers—but also partly because it was modeled to me when I was a lad. Pop Bare worked until he was 80. At points during his life, he worked more than one job, and when I was a cub, he often worked three jobs. Rich and I did the same. I cannot think of a time when I haven't had a job. When not working, of course, there were other things to do. Rich was married and a homeowner quite early on and spent a lot of time fixing things or renovating rooms around his flat, and later, his house. I had school, a band, work, and chores. I won't say we didn't rest, but we didn't rest much.

During leisure time, we liked to be up and doing, as well. Cooking, swimming, or playing yard games. If we did ever sit down, it was after the table had been cleared and the kitchen tidied up. By then, we were shattered and ready to head to bed. Even then, we didn't rest right away. We watched TV, folded laundry, or read until our eyelids whacked. This was modeled to us, and it is how we lived.

To sit and read at any other time than bedtime, (I have always loved day reading), felt too still for anyone in the family to endure for very long. I won't say the Bares aren't readers; newspapers could always be found on the kitchen table, but sitting in one place for long is not something many of us are accustomed to. Being that I was always the black sheep of the clan, especially as it involved my affection for stealing away with a good book, this behavior of mine was often the point at issue when my parents hauled up their slacks to lay into me about being lazy.

So, rather than finding a nice shady spot under a tree or curling up by a window on a rainy afternoon to let my eyes wander over the printed page, I developed a kind of aversion to being seen not moving. I'm not saying that I never laid about, but if I did it was when my family weren't likely to cause me grief about it. There is nothing worse then getting sloshed about the ears for participating in one’s favorite pastime. Thus, I got in the habit of reading when everyone else was getting their eight hours.

And so, I have an inbuilt antipathy to appearing to not do anything. Thus, just sitting about has always been a bit of a sore spot, even in adulthood, wherein I am master of my own destiny, so to speak. It always seemed as though my pater or mater would come along the passage, heave me up by the earlobe and frog march me outside with a crisp order to rake up sticks or trim the camellias.

How the Other Half Rests 

When I was accepted into Micki’s family, I found that they were no less busy and active as my own. The only difference was, they seemed to know how to rest, as well. After a long day of helping her father in the yard, we would cook food and then watch a movie together in the family room. On Saturdays, getting up early to start on a project was expected, so that we could stop at lunch and rest in the TV room and put golf or college sports on the big TV.

Micki’s family also like to play games or cards around the table (not something the Bares are in any way accustomed to). Sometimes, they like to just sit and talk things over, sharing this or that anecdote, catching up on the family news. When Micki’s elderly (but extremely active and fit) aunt and uncle visited a few weeks ago, we primarily spent the entire visit actually visiting. We sat in the den or around the dining room table just talking, which was lovely. We hadn't seen them for years, and so we spent the time catching up, as it were.

The Bares always visited family, particularly my paternal grandmother's house, but I always got the sense everyone was ready to be done with the jabbering and get on to hosing down the porches or packing lunches for the week. I think my inability to sit still, which is to say, keep still like a normal human being while sitting, is probably a symptom of the larger genetic urge to be out behind a plow or forking hay into the barn. We thrive on being out and doing. Sitting still, being calm, chatting with pals or family, just hanging out are all behaviors that are essentially alien to us.

The Restful Path

We are no less busy now than ever before. Of course, I'm weighing into this equation the fact that the boys are older and direct their own affairs now. There was a time when we rushed around to bring them to baseball, football, and basketball games. One summer weekend, we had six baseball games in one day, with each lad playing at least one at a local ball field. We used to slide into bed at night like a baserunner diving for home plate. The next morning, we would get up and do it all over again.

So, it's not quite as frenetic as all that these days. We're busy, but now and then, we have a chance to rest. Like ice cream, the chance to rest never feels like quite enough, but, also like ice cream, they tell me, too much could be detrimental, so we try to make the best of it while it lasts. We are quick to jump to the next visit, book event, adventure, or tour of errands and chores. 

I will say it is nice not to have anyone chivvying me out of my cozy spot to “look busy”. Laziness is perhaps in the eye of the beholder. There are some lazy folks out there, but their plight isn't even close to mine. I value a moment to stop and recall all that we have to be grateful for, to build relationships with our friends, family, and ourselves. I like to think that each week needs a little leisure time built in so we stay on the right side of sanity. No one will say of us that we frittered away our time lying in bed and eating bonbons, letting the house and grounds wither.

It is with that in mind that I put aside my book, stretch out on the settee, and close my eyes for a few minutes' rest. Not stolen, but earned. To me, all leisure is earned and therefore justified. If I feel the need for a break, a rest, or a desire to put up my tools and recover, I do it. And since, as they say, a home is a castle within which the head couple rule, then the only one to stop me is me.