Catharthic
Deerfield Beach, FL, December 2010
This morning we drove through rush-hour traffic on roads lined with palm trees. The windows were down as the Miami-region FM morning hosts bantered in our ears. Late this afternoon and half a continent away, we drove through blinding snow under a darkening sky, our headlights barely cutting through the murk as Toronto-area news anchors updated traffic conditions on Canada's largest highway. No palm trees in sight.
We'd been away for a bit, spending some much-needed quiet time among family. I was about as far off the grid as I've ever been. No data on the BlackBerry, only occasional checks of e-mail to make sure nothing was burning down back home. The blog magically updated itself with scheduled posts, and assigned articles were still written to deadline. The difference is they were written poolside, using whatever WiFi signal I could scavenge. I kept the netbook on battery power to ensure I wrote quickly.
As much as I wanted to keep us all there for much longer, life awaited us back home. Vacations are wonderful things, opportunities to slow things down and remind ourselves why we all matter so much to each other. Why the quiet moments matter as much as the momentous ones. But like a good dessert, it doesn't taste quite as special if that's all there is.
As you may have imagined, I took a lot of pictures and I'll be sharing some of them in the days and weeks to come. I wanted to start with this one because it reinforces my belief that southern light is entirely different than northern light. And sometimes you need to go far from home to see things from a new perspective.
Your turn: Did you change gears a bit over the holiday season? What did you learn along the way?
