Vacations

Vacation.

This word can mean and suggest many different things.

It could be an entire week away at some tropical resort, or just taking a day off work to get some major chores done around the house.

It can be a 1980's movie about a family taking a road trip.
Or a 2015 movie about a family taking a road trip. (Which could easily lead to a blog post wondering why so many movies are remakes lately.)

But regardless of how you use the word, the fact remains, there are still a lot of people who cannot, in reality, take a vacation, or at least not do so easily.

I don't just mean they can't afford it, as big a factor as that is.

Of course, there are people who can't take time off work, or they'll lose their job. Depending on the job, maybe they can't even take that one day off to do whatever needs done. They might not even be able to take off when they are very sick and need to. And no matter how many would say to that, "Oh, then they should just get a better job", we know this is much more easily said than done.

But there are other reasons it can be difficult to take a vacation.
Responsibilities.
Care giving.
Caring for a severely disabled child, relative, parent.
Caring for a house full of special needs rescue pets.

(And if anybody wants to take me to task for mentioning those two things right after each other... "Don't compare your cat to my child!" or whatever... well, it's not what I'm trying to do. I'm just thinking and trying to write.)

Not having anyone you can call or count on to relieve you of the responsibility. Or at least feeling this is the case. Or just not knowing if you can.

There are a lot of people in those situations.

They can't just hop on a plane and put their cares behind them.
Even if they do find someone who can fill in for them giving care for a few days or a week, there's the question of whether or not you can trust the person filling in.

Or, how about if you yourself are the person who needs a lot of care?

Can you just run off on a trip?

Maybe you have a wheelchair? Oxygen tank? Severe dietary restrictions or food allergies that preclude most restaurant meals? Some other need that is just not easily accomodated away from home?

And back to the special need pets-

If you are reading this, you probably aren't a cat or dog, but special need animals can have needs that are beyond the knowledge of a typical pet sitter. With such pets, a vacation means you are looking at either hiring a vet tech to come to your house, or medical boarding.

People might technically be able to afford a vacation, but not able to afford to actually leave to take it.


And of course, this isn't even covering people who are homeless, and a whole lot of other situations.

It's not a list of everyone who can't take a vacation.

It's not blaming anybody for anything, either. It's not trying to make anyone going on a vacation feel guilty for it. Have fun. Seriously.

It's just something I thought about.

OK. Carry on.