Sucking your vacation away

Since graduation on Friday, I took a few days off. Actually one of them was my regularly scheduled day off, and in one I went to NYC with my mother- and sister-in-law, (which deserves its own post) which had been planned for 9 mos., so I just decided to take the intervening day off, slap on a weekend, and make a vacation of the whole thing.

Boy, was that a good idea.

I've never taken a few days off just to do it, with no real plans and no destinations. It was great. I caught up with people, did some housework, did a little shopping, and just kind of hung around. It was a reminder to me that there is a beautiful sun which shines in our sky - I normally only see it when it is waking up and going to sleep. These last spring days were full of good weather, cool breezes and the smell of hyacinth. After 2.5 years of gogogogogogogogo with school, this was quite a relief. It was well earned.

But now, I've got to grind, grind, grind at that grindstone, as Bert says, and I'm back to work where my co-workers seek to reduce the pleasure of my days off by grilling me about it.

Last night as I was falling asleep, I was trying to look forward to coming back. It wasn't effective. But I did it nonetheless (though I was an hour late today, oh well) and as soon as I walked in the door, it was like being pulled into a dark closet, shoved onto a shaky wooden stool, and having a high-wattage bulb shined into your eyes. A lot of "look who's back" and "nice to finally see you at work," as if I didn't deserve to take the time off. Additionally, everyone wants to know where you were, what you did, and how it was, draining the enjoyable details of your life away from your mental inner sanctum.

They're like vacation-starved, enjoyment-sucking cretins from the netherworld (here's what I'm thinking) who are bound and determined to not let you enjoy the memory of your refreshing days in the sun.

Granted, there are some co-workers who I like very much and looked forward to swapping stories with. But the others - pasty, grasping, hollow-eyed goblins - get your own vacation days.