I unplugged this past weekend, for the most part. My phone was on “do not disturb” all weekend with settings that would only allow my husband and my younger daughter’s best friend to get up with us. I did this for our annual mother-daughter beach weekend, and I frankly don’t want it to end. The lack of notifications, that is. Well, the weekend, too, but we had to get back to real life eventually. And husband/dad. And cats.
Hurricane Lee churned across the Atlantic, growing ever closer to the Caribbean and maybe us without any observation or tracking by me.
Politics went on, and we didn’t care. Politicians flung manufactured outrage and deception, and we didn’t hear it or even know about it.
People posted in our volunteer community, and I didn’t read the posts right then, and that’s okay. They’re still there waiting for us.
Vacation messages went out in response to emails, and I deactivated my Gmail app. I didn’t want to be bothered, didn’t want anyone to intrude on this time. I also didn’t want to be tempted to check it. And truth, I hated having to get into my email because, again, I liked the digital solitude.
I put a vacation message on my voicemail so not even voicemail notifications would try to capture my attention.
TikTokers still recorded and posted messages that I’m sure they feel are important, and they passed me by. If I find I care enough to go back and watch them, I will. But likely I won’t.
For the weekend I didn’t think about or worry about church stuff. I didn’t worry about the small Bible study group that people think I’m going to take over when I have no interest in doing so (much as I love them). The topic didn’t even come up between Hannah and me about future youth activities. I didn’t think about the usual faith-based things on my mind, like my reconstruction, podcasts, how to love and serve in community in ways we’d find fulfilling, or even which community in which to do those things.
This freed me up to experience the spiritual and the holy. The entire weekend was marvelous, but Saturday night Hannah and I took a walk which metamorphosized the weekend into the realm of the spiritual in the midst of the holy.
We’d had dinner and walked to get ice cream. We had planned to watch a movie after we got back to the room. But we started walking along the beach. As we walked, we held hands. She still likes to do that with me. And we talked–about pretty much everything. Eventually talk came to a memorial service we had coming up in the next week. We talked about the departed family member, and we grieved. We didn’t so much grieve the loss of the relative but the loss of relationship for one of us, and that there never really was one for the other.
Under God’s holy sepulcher where whispy clouds played hide-and-seek with diamond-brilliant stars across a black velvet sky, I shared a dream I’d had about our dead aunt right before our trip. My daughter said, “I don’t think I need to help you interpret that one.” Never mind who taught her various psychological methods of dream interpretation. The dream felt spiritual, like I was saying in my mind and spirit what I didn’t get a chance to say before she died and having her hear me, as well.
The walk went and went and went. We stepped on cold slimy things that we hoped were seaweed or palm fronds drenched from the day’s rains. Cool water occasionally kissed our feet, dampening the hem of my pants. And still we held hands and talked. We logged about three miles total, walking on the beach.
Last week I’d sensed that this weekend would be her and my best weekend to date, and I was right. No longer is the specter of the pain her older sister inflicted on my heart three years ago when I took her to the beach haunting me. I was surprised on Friday to discover that pain, that heart-hurt, is gone, leaving me feeling completely liberated. And I lived fully into that liberation all weekend long.
All because I unplugged for the weekend.
