Washington vacations — going away without getting away

We are leaving today. I’m so excited: An actual vacation!” “All of you?”

“The whole family,” the woman on the other end of the phone said exultantly. She talked of the relatives they would visit, the wild, natural beauty the children would behold, the bonding time they would spend together.

It sounded lovely, but something did not compute. “Wait,” I asked, “Your husband is taking three weeks off?”

My friend laughed. This is Washington, not Milan; what kind of cockamamie question was that?

“I wish. No, he’s flying down later to join us for a week. And of course he’ll be in touch.”

Ah. Well, that tends to be what constitutes a family vacation, for those in the D.C. professional classes who are fortunate enough to be employed. A high-level person may be entitled to three or even four weeks of holiday, but woe betide the man or woman who actually disappears for that long.

Fortunately, Wi-Fi is a miracle. It makes it possible for an executive such as my friend’s husband to go on vacation with his family while also staying connected to the office.

Unfortunately, Wi-Fi is also a curse. It means that no matter where the family goes, the father (or mother, or both) is likely to be staying connected to the office. It means that the impatient “can’t-you-kids-see-that-I’m-on-the-phone?” face that parents use at home they’ll also use in some corner of paradise. The same blank faces that are too often bent over touch screens at home will be bent over them at the beach. Even in the windy wilds of wherever, someone in the family will be texting. It is the way we live now.

Perhaps it will not be the way we live forever, though. In the past few months, as friends have gone on vacation and returned with tales of adventure and tedium, I’ve noticed an undertow of disquiet at the degree to which going away no longer means getting away.

One man, who had stayed for a week with his family in a lakeside cottage with no Internet, spoke of the odd psychic freedom it gave him, to wake up without being able to check email on his computer. Because he couldn’t check it, he didn’t check it; because he wasn’t looking at a screen, he realized he was paying more attention to his wife and children. When he did find Wi-Fi, on day trips, he noticed not only the gratification of resuming his dopamine feed but also feelings of stress that seemed to come simply from reconnecting with the news maelstrom.

“Frankly, it’s tough for him to get away, this close to the election,” my friend was saying of the hungry vortex of 2012. “We’re lucky he can come at all.”

In the modern era, one of the greatest gifts a person can give is his full attention. For families, it’s becoming a rare gift indeed.

Speaking of “actual vacations,” I’m taking a column break for the next few weeks. See you back in these pages, first thing in September.

Meghan Cox Gurdon’s column appears on Sunday and Thursday. She can be contacted at [email protected].

Related Content