a weekend away

2025 · 07

M. and I went off for two nights, somewhere green and quiet and far enough that there was nothing useful either of us could have done even if we'd wanted to. That was the whole idea. We'd been talking about it for months and finally just booked it one evening before we could talk ourselves out of it.

Mostly we walked. There was a path that ran along the water for a long way, and we did all of it the first afternoon and then, having nothing else on, most of it again the next morning. Odd luxury, walking somewhere with no end point and nobody waiting on you. I kept catching myself scanning the reeds for the heron from our own park, out of pure habit, and obviously it wasn't there. Different water.

Otherwise we did almost nothing, which was right. Read on a bench. Ate slowly. Had one small row about which way to go at a junction that sorted itself out the second we both admitted we had no idea. M. is much better at doing nothing than I am. First morning I was twitchy, sure I ought to be getting something done, and by the second I'd lost track of what that would even have been.

Came back tired in the good way. Flat felt smaller and nicer than when we left. The basil, three days alone, had put on another inch out of spite.