Violet Sky

Recently, I had a nice weekend. It was a long weekend, which meant that myself and my youngest child had the day off. My husband and my daughter also had the day off, but since it was a Monday, that’s less notable for them – my husband works Tuesday through Friday, and my daughter doesn’t have classes on Mondays. But for the remaining two of us, Friday was an exciting day and I even dipped out from work a little early once I’d gotten my work into a stable place.

Friday night, I attempted to give myself a hangover, for no real reason other than the fact that I just finished months of half marathon training, where I was very careful about what I ate and drank, and felt like being a little irresponsible now that the race was over. My husband and I went out to a local brewpub, where we split a flight (a sampler platter of smaller beers) and an appetizer while chatting at the bar.

We brought a four pack of beer home and had our usual wind down routine of watching whichever show from our catalogue of in-progress shows sounded the most interesting. I believe it was Murderbot, this evening. Despite having an additional drink at home, I didn’t manage to give myself a hangover the next day, which was kind of funny. First, I felt old because I was planning my hangover, then I felt young because I didn’t manage to give myself one! Probably drinking two beers over the course of 4 hours wasn’t a great way to hit my goal, in retrospect.

On Saturday, we had a happy hour event we were going to be attending in the evening, so we made sure to get our meal planning and grocery shopping done in advance. The event was about half an hour away, so we got the kids some Little Caesar’s pizza (remember when Hot & Ready pizzas were $5? They’re $8 now) and headed off down the freeway. Two hours, lots of conversation, and a mediocre cocktail later, we headed back home, watched an episode of Ted Lasso to wind down, and went to bed.

I had brunch with a friend planned for Sunday, so I set my alarm for 8 a.m. out of paranoia that I wouldn’t wake up in time to shower. I woke up at 7:52 a.m., so I guess no paranoia needed. Continuing the pattern of partaking in things that I was better off not taking while I was half training, I was able to finally try the chimichurri shrimp and grits I’ve been eyeing since we first visited this restaurant. It was delicious! We had a good catch up in a corner of the restaurant. While I was out, my husband was riding his bicycle with his brother; since I was driving his car, I took it through the car wash on the way back home. It’s rewarding to me to do these little things to help out my loved ones.

Overnight, our cat had broken into the fresh sleeve of bagels we had bought at the grocery store, so I looked up a fast recipe to make my own bagels. This was my second time ever making bagels, and it’s always fun to feel like I’m getting a little better at something. I also just really enjoy being able to provide something basic like this for my family, versus buying it from the stores, so it was rewarding to whip out a solution with the tools I had at home.

My youngest child is learning how to drive, and a good part of the rest of the day was me sitting in the passenger seat (knuckles only a little white) while he demonstrated his increasing prowess at driving on main roads. Scary, but successful!

Monday, our beautiful bonus weekend day. My husband and I wanted to go on a hike, so we pinged the kids first thing in the morning to ask if either of them wanted to come with us. Somewhat surprisingly, our daughter did, so we all loaded up into the car, used her employee discount to buy some coffee at Starbucks, and headed into the Columbia River Gorge to find a trail that I had been wanting to hike again for several years now.

The trail was beautiful, lush with native wildflowers, and the weather was a perfect 60-something Fahrenheit. We found a parking spot off the road and started marching up the mountain, having winding conversations as we went. The trail we were on goes on for many miles, but our goal was to hike up to the first overlook.

After some scenic shots from the first overlook, we headed back down the trail and back to our car. We’ve been trying to get to a food cart near our house that serves some excellent chicken shawarma, because neither of us have tried their chicken shawarma wraps, but it was closed for memorial day. We instead tried a different food truck, which was fine, but didn’t quite scratch the itch. Maybe next time.

For the rest of the day, with all our chores done and all of our “it would be nice if we could do this” also checked off, we spent the rest of the day relaxing, gardening, and doing some minor cleaning.

When I have nice weekends like this, where the extra day seems to give me exponentially more time to do my hobbies, interests, and (yes) chores without the crush of the work week, I think about early retirement. I have so many things that I like to do, and so many people that I do my best to keep up with – imagine how amazing it would be to not have to cram these good weekends into two or three days. We live very well and we don’t deprive ourselves, but sometimes the relaxing weekend at home with a hike and a brunch is just as rewarding as the international trip or the good seats at a music event.

I can’t wait for early retirement.