This is the dawning of the rest of our lives

The title is taken from the Green Day song “Holiday”, it’s relevant, so go with it.

Last week I was talking to a friend of mine. Mike had had just come back from two weeks touring Northern Italy. He spent a delightful two weeks away from everything driving around Tuscany. He took a relaxing few days in Florence, a few more in Siena, a side trip to Pisa and so much good food, wine and so on, and so on…

Envious… Moi? Perhaps a little.

In England time off is called a “holiday”. Wikipedia says holiday comes from and Old English word that meant special religious days away from toil. In England today it means a day or days of rest or relaxation.

In the US it’s called a Vacation, which means something totally different. It comes from the Latin and means “empty time”. The root is “vacare”, which means “to be empty”. Hmmmm…

Seriously, I love Wikipedia. One thing, please note that Green Day , Weezer, Jet and Madonna (to mention a few) sang songs about Holidays, and not vacations.

It’s well documented that the US has fewer holidays than any other; a quick Google search will show all sorts of facts. Typically they show that France and Italy (35 to 40 days a year) come close to the top of the table, while a long way down is the US (12 or 13 days a year).

It gets even scarier, I work with people who don’t take the full amount every year and have actually lost holiday days because they never took them. I don’t get it.

Despite being off ill at times this summer I’ve taken calls from my boss and logged into work to take care of things. When I went to London for a few days earlier this year I took a work laptop (with permission) and spent time taking care of business. Lets not even bring up the subject of Blackberry’s.

Have one of those and checking email is an expectation, no matter where in the world you are. This being tied to work does not make me unique, it’s almost normal in my office.

This week one of the lead engineers used one of the ugliest compound words I’ve ever heard (and I studied German, not what one would call a “romantic” language), they said they were having a “Staycation”. He was taking time off, but not going too far from home, he wanted to be around in case he was needed.

My boss has taken a series of long weekends this summer, but never more than two days beyond the weekend. He’s not had a full week off for over a year, he just does not feel he can leave; there is so much pressure.

It’s been noted by a number of people that I can get into relaxed holiday mode very quickly, driving to the airport is probably long enough, but even with that super-power a four-day break is just not enough.

I’ve been thinking about this and I think the minimum is two full weeks. A few days to get over the jetlag and get into full relaxation form (mojitos and a beach can speed this up). This leaves a full week to relax and have fun before gently preparing to return to the real world.

I like what I do and my managers have been awesome this summer in supporting me, they really have, but next summer I’m taking a full two weeks. It’s the Olympics in London, and I’m not missing that, but I’m going somewhere else for a few days too. After this year I will appreciate it more than ever.

As for Mike and Mrs. Mike’s holiday, they had a great time. And he says the only pieces of electronics he switched on were his camera and Kindle. That sounds like a proper holiday.

On another personal note, thanks for the e-mail, texts and support (and my backlog of 315 comments). It’s not all over, but the surgeries and heavy drugs are done for now. We are getting close and tomorrow is a big day. I’ll be talking about it here in the future.

I love my life.