One thing about unstructured vacations is that they can be time eaters.

In an effort to not throw away vacation too much time that I have earned, that will "expire" next month, I schedule this week off from work.

I really don't have the time to take time off, which seems to be the problem with why I risk loosing what I have earned. But there reaches a state where the work effort seems to have diminishing returns. Working in a job that can jump between a sprint and a marathon in the same day.

On my "to-do" list last week was to "plan out vacation". There are a couple of family things but we will do but not everyone is on the same time off schedule. Of course as I left work Friday with that list at least fractured and final meetings and emails off directing some activities while i am gone so that I can incorporate that work when I return, my own planning somewhat fell off the list.

So, Sunday morning I develop my list. Three columns, a full page of not just tasks, but new projects, working on partially started projects and some planning as well.
I thrown running and skiing and perhaps a massage on the list for some fun and make me feel like vacation.

There is something to be said about idleness though it is not well accepted, always in a negative tone but sometimes I wonder if that is what is necessary. Like many people I have such a big "list" is because of the influence of work and commuting in taking both physical time and draining so much energy that it effect the efficiency of how other time is used. The list of things that need to be done gets so long and involved that just looking at it is enough to drain energy quicker than pulling the plug on a pool.

So, I am a couple days into vacation. A day in the city with family was fun then Sunday and Monday were those kind of unstructured days when there are specific chores and tasks that need to be done but in between time fritters away. The pellet stove got a needed full clean, and the drive and walk cleared of the snow and a movie and a few things off the list, but not much more.

It's 14 degrees outside. Uncomfortable for running or skiing, at lest for me. The snow is hard and icy and cold seems biting. Yesterday was just a little better but the motivation was not there to even try.

So I am re-looking at my list. It is a sure set up for disappointment by week end and I am thinking I need to toss it and start over. There aren't any unnecessary things on the list and if I worked just a bit more I could have made it a small several pages long, but what good would that do.

A friend emailed me a link to a site on zen moments that she thought I might be interested in. The lead paragraph, which she has no reason to know, described almost exactly the same serious incident that occurred in my life almost 20 years ago that changed many things in my life. I came through miraculously better than the writer, and where he has had to deal with the physical recovery, my struggle has been with the recovery of what is not externally evident to others or to most not even known or noticed. But it is there and I work with it every day. Through this process I have I learned that it is sometimes necessary for me to regroup, break things down to component pieces and try not to feel defeated in the process.

Why did I digress and add such a personal note, I don't know. But I'll leave it in for the moment.

As I look out over the backyard, the sun shining through the trees across the white snow. The rolling smoothness of white, the slumps of snow still on the shielded branches. No movement except the slight swaying of branches at the top. The shadows are fixed, the sky is blue.

I just opened up another internet explorer window and do a Google search on running in real cold weather. I think I need to try this, clear my head and then my list and week will have more clarity than it does now.