Once again, the Long and Short Reviews Wednesday Weekly Blog Challenge – and what a weird prompt post-pandemic. I’ve always been a wanderlust person. I’ve moved around quite a bit. Even after finally settling in the Philly-area, I went and taught every summer in New England for over a decade, up until the pandemic. And traveled on top of that. But I’ll admit I’ve been traveling a lot less in the past few years. I miss the travel (though am booked to visit a friend in the Pacific Northwest this summer).
But cheers to staycations! Travel and vacations can be exhausting. I remember living abroad and a group of friends of various nationalities started comparing national styles of vacationing. A Greek friend compared the Greek “let’s go lie on a beach” style of vacation to the American vacation-style. Essentially, they said that the American work-ethic meant that we felt compelled to do things even on vacation, that we went so far as to invent places with a series of tasks to complete (their description of amusement parks). That conversation has always had me looking at vacations – the numerous American jokes about needing a vacation after one’s vacation – differently. (Admittedly, I’m a bit of a go-go-goer on vacation – my mother once called my vacation style an endurance test).
So staycations can be wonderful. But I do think you have to really think it through so it’s an actual vacation, not just a series of days off. That somehow you have to change up the rhythm of your life. It’s like rest-days from exercise. Just sitting isn’t really a great way to do it. You just change/slow down the rhythm of things (yoga, a walk, etc.). So if you are staycating, choose things to do that refresh and rejuvenate you, that get you out of your house even if. not out of your area.
But perhaps that’s the American in me and sitting on one’s couch might just be the perfect staycation for some.
Ramblings 
I love “that we went so far as to invent places with a series of tasks to complete (their description of amusement parks).” It really made me chuckle.
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I love your friend’s thoughts on American-style vacations. Yes, there is definitely the compulsion to do a lot during them.
A Greek-style vacation sounds wonderfully relaxing.
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That’s a good point about American vacations being a bit like work — people create long lists of things They Have to See, following schedules, etc. I’m guilty to that to some extent, but I try to err more on the side of spontaneity: when I went to St. Augustine, I mostly just wandered around and found things as they presented themselves.
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