My wife likes to plan things far in advance, which is very smart. As this summer approached, she planned out all the trips she planned to take alongside the trips I needed to take for conventions. Far in advance, it all worked out well and fit nicely into the schedule.
Now that we’re actually living the schedule, we came to realize that perhaps we’re traveling too much this summer.
Last month my wife and son were gone for a week to visit her best friend in another state. One week later I took my son with me to a convention in the midwest and visited family. The week after that I turned around and exhibited at ConnectiCon, and although that wasn’t far away I was still gone for several days. Now that ConnectiCon weekend is over, my wife and son have a week and a half before they go to her family’s annual vacation spot for two weeks while I stay behind to watch the cats. Near the end of those two weeks I’ll be joining my friends in an out-of-state birthday gathering for the weekend, meaning my wife and I will be missing each other by a day. And a little over a week after that, I head out off to exhibit at DragonCon with Garth, with travel time and a four-day show meaning I’ll be gone for almost a week.
Near the beginning of the summer my parents asked me if I would have any spare time to visit them again. Looking at our schedule these past and next weeks, I’ll be lucky for the opportunities to see the family that I live with, much less family that lives in other states.
The lesson we learned from this overbooked summer is that just because you have the time to do something doesn’t mean you should always make yourself available for everything.