It was the big event of the whole summer, after the Sunday school excursion. Mum and dad would get us into the Morris Oxford and we'd all trundle off, over the border in the direction of Dublin. Once, we made it all the way to the city and spent the whole day at the zoo but twice we never intended to go that far and somewhere south of Drogheda, we turned left off the main road and ended up at Mosney where Butlins ran their holiday camp. It was a great day out too, getting on all the rides , having a bite to eat and stating until late in the evening before starting the long, slow journey back northwards. And that was the length of our summer vacation most years, even though we had a couple of months off school, but there was always plenty to keep one amused around home and the summer just seemed to go on for ever. Once or twice we went with mum to stay at her aunt's house in Rostrevor and climbed up to the 'big stone' in the rain but the whole vacation was no more than two or three days and occasionally the same sort of period might have been spent in Belfast with our grandparents but these were generally infrequent visits and certainly most summers were spectacular in their similarity. Then one year we really pushed the boat out and mum, sister and I joined with our aunt to holiday in Portrush for five days. It was a great feeling that, come late in the evening, we didn't have to pack everything into the car and head home, but instead there was the chance of some late night chips or a drink in a cafe and you could hear the seas outside the window as you dozed off to sleep. only to be wakened the next morning by a million seagulls who had chosen your window sill to have their early morning gossip. Two things are memorable about that vacation. First, we went on one of those Ulsterbus 'mystery tours' for an evening. You know the sort, where the only mystery is how the bus company chose such an uninteresting route, winding through country lanes between high hedges, but maybe it was just too much like home from home for me. Anyway, I remember sitting in the back of the bus, probably about fourteen years old at the time, with the earpiece of my trannie feeding the latest releases into my head and being totally fixated with 'Watching the River Flow' by Bob Dylan. But the other memory is something that only really registered much later in life, when I realised that the young girl who was a relatives of my mates from school whom I met for footie and cricket at the beach on several afternoons, would some day be my wife. What a strange world!
Well guess what? Tomorrow is vacation time all over again. Sometimes, I really envy my mate George in Australia, but in the best possible way, when I realise that every six weeks or so, he seems to have a holiday from school. But not today, for I know that while he is about to end his term for a couple of weeks away from the chalkboard or whiteboard, by midday tomorrow I'll be starting a whole weeks of a school free environment with that young girl who use to watch the big boys play on the beach at Portrush. Now I know what the less kind amongst the world population will be saying in reply and it will probably include such phrases as 'finishing at three o'clock', 'getting too many holidays when the rest of us are slaving away' and 'always complaining about the workload'. But you know, tonight I really don't care about opinions of those poor mortals who are clocking in next Monday as usual. Why? Because I know I've earned the right to have a rest and recharge the batteries and I guess I don't go around complaining about the benefits that other jobs might bring, that we teachers can't really avail of, like cheap flights and holidays, free evenings and weekends and flexi time so that the golf course, the shopping trip or the lie in can be accommodated.
Jesus understood the value of rest for when He saw His disciples under too much pressure so that they didn't even have time to eat, He said to them 'Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest.' And isn't that what our 'quiet time' really is every day, a vacation from the pressures of life that seem to overtake and control us, a chance to recharge our batteries with the goodness that only He can give us. I note that Jesus didn't send them alone but went with them and in fact led them to where He wanted them to be and to rest. The Psalmist probably puts it better than I can when He writes 'He makes me lie down in green pastures, He leads me beside quiet waters, He restores my soul.' So apart from the physical regeneration that we hope to experience over the next couple of months, I long for the daily spiritual revival that my time of rest with Him will bring. Have you had your spiritual vacation today?
