Just Passing Through: Summer Holiday Reflections
I have just returned from an amazing couple of weeks roaming around Wales in our motorhome L’Escargot, and swimming and paddle-boarding on remote sun-kissed lakes and beaches. The weather was extraordinary, particularly for Wales (I won’t go into the reason for this in this blog, suffice it to say that they are extremely worrying) but for a while life felt idyllic.
I don’t know about you, but every time I go on holiday to somewhere beautiful I find myself hankering to up sticks and move there permanently. In fact, when my Australian husband first came to the UK to live with me, we travelled all over England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales and found at least two or three potential locations for relocation each year. While on holiday, we were drawn like months to the windows of estate agents in every beautiful town we passed through, and would spend months on our return home fantasising about an alternative existence which such locations seem to offer.
Of course, thousands give in to this urge, particularly in their later years, and relocate to beloved holiday destinations all over Europe and beyond. It is a well-trodden path and one we too might have followed had it not been for elderly parents and young children in schools who required a sense of stability. I was particularly drawn to the idea of living in Wales having spent five years living by the sea in Aberystwyth while I studied for a BA and Masters in Fine Art. In my imagination I could see myself living in a cottage high up on a sheep strewn hillside, roaming the beaches and heather covered mountainsides sketchbook in hand, and walking through the town towards the tantalising sun-glistened Irish Sea.
However, on this most recent holiday, it dawned on me that I was, for once, revelling in the beauty of the places that we visited without feeling a need to somehow capture and ‘possess’ the experience. As we passed through the exquisite emerald green hillsides of Snowdonia down to my old stomping ground of Aberystwyth, I found myself appreciating the impermanence of the moment.
Perhaps it is cancer that has taught me to hold such experiences more lightly; to more fully appreciate the beauty of the moment without sullying the experience with the desire to prolong. Or perhaps it is the wisdom of years that enables me to see that the grass is not always greener on the other side and that some experiences are better just passing through. Leaving aside the fact that the sun does not always shine in Wales (it seemed to drizzle for a majority of my five years in Aberystwyth), the reality is that even if we move to the most beautiful location we have ever seen, we cannot escape the inevitable troubles that we will all experience at one time or another. To think otherwise is to like ‘ a chasing after the wind’ (Ecclesiastes 9:6).
In 1 Corinthians 7:17 the Apostle Paul advises ‘don’t be wishing you were someplace else or with someone else. Where you are right now is God’s place for you.’ (MSG). This doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t take a holiday; in fact the whole concept of rest was built into the fabric of our lives by our Creator. The whole concept of a weekly time of rest Sabbath was ordained by God, along with the idea of a sabbath year every seven years in which the earth itself allowed to rest. He knows how important it is for us to be able to take a break from the daily grind and to have times of rest and renewal, and going away from our home base is a really good way to do this as it enables us to look our lives from a different perspective.
However, the key is to be able to take the novelty of those experiences and appreciate the joy of the moment – no matter how impermanent – and to be able to take all that we have learnt back with us and to be integrate this richness into the lives that we already have.
Kate Nicholas is a preacher, Christian author, broadcaster and consultant. Find out more about her books (including her latest release Soul’s Scribe – a guide to understanding and sharing your ‘soul story) , TV show, events and online courses at www.katenicholas.co.uk And subscribe to Kate’s blog Faith, Life and Cancer to follow her healing journey