We spent the past 2 weekends in the mountains. And aside from the discovery of bedbug bites upon returning from the cabin (which is a horribly gross and mortifying discovery …one which will be certainly remedied before we head back in a couple weeks with my dear friend Sarah Mae and her family), we had a fantastic time.
I don’t get cell service there.
Or internet.
Which is, for a person hosting a blogging and social media conference, a really wonderful thing.
I’m realizing that sometimes to mentally unplug, I have to literally unplug.
There is something about a steaming mug of coffee in the morning, or a glass of wine in the evening, looking out at this….
And even when we go out for a drive and service might pop in and out, sometimes…sometimes, we might just need to employ “airplane mode.”
So we can stop and notice things like 2 crosses naturally formed by the presence of quartz in a waterfall rock.
And if we really pause long enough to help our kids fashion spears from old arrowheads and cut down sapling trees, we might notice that the bark peels off and becomes pretty pliable. Rope-like almost…
And when one child says, “maybe we could make baskets from the bark…”
You might just stop and take the time to actually do it…because you took a basket-weaving class in summer camp when you were 14.
Because you’ve taken the time to stop, and to notice the things around you, you remember seeing a whole bunch of blackberries on the side of the road when you went hiking with your friends the weekend before.
So you go back with your kids and pick them… and put them in the basket you all just made together on the porch.
It’s so so pure… That life in the country that sometimes my heart longs to dive into headfirst. It’s the curiosity of Laura Ingles Wilder, and the tenacity of Anne Shirley both meeting, and exploring, and discovering the world around me. I bring my kids along for the ride, and open up those parts of them too.
So we go back, and make cobbler, and take some to the lonely neighbor next door.
And everything feels right in the world….the world unplugged and natural.
This will preach! I forgot my phone last night when we went out to celebrate a birthday. I enjoyed my time so much more without the distractions of the online world.
So so true! I think I’m going to be more intentional about being forgetful!
I want to go back! What a lucky gal you are to have such a wonderful place to unplug, jealous!
This is the reminder I needed that I need a Analog week soon!
Love this, Logan! I unplugged for two weeks in June … and it took me all of July and into August to get back into an online groove. Somehow, I think that was a good thing! And I’ve noticed since I took that extended break, I find everything online — even the work that pays the bills part — less pressing, less significant. I’ve even been considering declaring the car a tech-free zone!! {Since that seems to be where we spend the majority of time going to and fro … and school hasn’t even started yet! OY!}
It looks amazing! I hope to check it out soon . . . minus the bed bugs!(;
Beauty… it’s all beauty and such a gift and so much Yes and Amen to the unplugging!!! (Especially when it feels like the world would stop spinning if you were unreachable!)
And oh my stars? Those pictures, and that basket, and the slow exhale of slowing down!
Beauty… it’s all beauty!