Even freelancers need a break.

“If a man falls in a forest and doesn’t have a ‘real’ job, does anyone notice that he’s even gone?”

© Kirk Butts 2013

 

When my girlfriend and I booked a cabin outside the Great Smoky Mountains National Park earlier this month, many friends and acquaintances asked if freelance writers can call it a vacation when they go on, well…vacation.

That question failed to lead me to a George Berkeley-esque meditation, but I did reflect on what it means to be an independent contractor who works in a converted third-bedroom office. I’m not a full-time freelancer. By no means do I punch a clock, nor do I really even look at a clock throughout the day. Some mornings I sleep until 11. Some nights I’m up at 4am finishing a project. I can take a three-hour lunch break, go grocery shopping at midnight and have a glass of scotch whenever the hell I want. “NSFW” never apply to me. Besides the occasional pitch meeting or business call, I don’t have to worry about being late to anything. And I rarely ever have to put on a tie (though sometimes my dog will catch me wearing one over an old t-shirt as I sit down at the computer).

So for a guy who has almost all the time in the world to get work things done and do whatever I want in the meantime, why on earth would I consider a vacation, a vacation?

Hmm.

I may not (I don’t) deserve time off when all I have is time, but if there’s one person who does deserve a break from the real world, it’s my girlfriend.

NOT my girlfriend.

 As a new doctor, her time is either spent saving lives or trying not to take her own. Residency is to doctors like boot camp is to soldiers: little sleep, intermittent food and a shitload of stress. She’s done a 40-hour work week in two days. She comes home covered in blood, sweat and tears from dying patients, their loved ones and her own eyes, yet she beats the sun every morning to go do it again. It has been her dream to become a doctor since she was four years old, so you could say she was (almost) born to do this. I wanted to be a garbage man when I was four. I also threw out half a dozen college majors before deciding to become a journalist. So when I say I’m amazed at who she is and what she does, I hope someone throws a hardcover thesaurus at my face. “Amazing” simply doesn’t do her justice. It’s okay…she’ll fix me.

Vacations are meant for workers with the means to take one. I still struggle with the concept of freelancing as traditional work. I’m both boss and employee, contractor and client. But I do work. Vacations, in my own opinion and experience, also aren’t nearly as fun when taken alone. We had an absolute pleasure on our trip, hiking through the park all day and hot tubbing in our cabin all night. On our final night out there, we enjoyed a bottle of western North Carolina’s finest bubbly and made a toast with our plastic cups about where we have been, where we are and where we’re going.

Whether doctor or freelance writer, everyone who works inevitably has the real world to look forward to. For those harder workers with more responsibilities and deadlines, vacations are much more significant. But even for a guy who sleeps in, stays up and shops late, my vacations are so meaningful because they mean so much to my girlfriend. It makes my morning to see her sleep through it, and it makes my night when she can stay up for most of it, too. I may have breaks every day, but it’s never a vacation unless she’s there with me.

Especially…when there’s a hot tub.

© Kirk Butts 2013