Staycation

It really is a genuine word. In the dictionary and everything. Even though it’s not been around very long. According to our good friends at Wikipedia the word was first coined on that great Canadian tv show “Corner Gas” in 2005 and was taken officially into the Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary in 2009! Once again, Canadian comics impact the universe.

Staycations grew out of major economic problems, low monetary rates, high gas prices. It just got too expensive to travel for holidays and families en masse were deciding to just stay home and take advantage of the attractions in their own backyards.

So what’s the difference, some may ask, between this staycation and just hanging around home being bored because you can’t afford to take a real vacation? And the answer, of course, is attitude, That and intention. If you just sit on the couch and feel deprived, it isn’t a real staycation at all. You must make a plan, whether it’s to put your picnic lunch in a basket and take it to the park on the corner, or you decide to spend the whole day blowing bubbles in the wading pool in your own backyard, your holiday attitude makes all the difference. Put on your sun hats and your sun screen, pack sandwiches and juice boxes in your back pack and hike to the municipal museum. It’s only twelve blocks and you’ve never been there!

See what I mean?

It’s quite similar to our conversation the other day about “Ordinary time.”

You could feel sorry that you couldn’t get the time off to go to reunion this summer (because that’s where all the really spiritual stuff happens) or you could strike up a conversation with that person who always seems to be sitting alone in the coffee shop. Maybe they need a friend. Could be they’re new in the neighbourhood and hoping to meet somebody too. Look around and really see who needs a friendly connection.

What might you do to be intentional about your discipleship during this ordinary, stay at home time? What’s going on right there in your own neighbourhood that needs some attention? Can you see anyone already working to abolish poverty and end suffering? What peace and justice projects are happening right there in your community that need you to pitch in? Human need doesn’t take a vacation.

Too often, I think, we wish someone else would come along. We long for more active young adults to turn up on our congregation or community. We think we should invite the apostle or the seventy to visit us and “turn things around” in our struggling congregation. Heaven forbid we’re waiting for fall when congregational life cranks back into action.

I’m suggesting we put on a good positive “staycation outlook” and start making things happen ourselves. After all, we already live here. Let’s exercise our initiative and get things growing. It’s the green season!

Posted by Marion