Take a Vacation from The News

aTake A Vacation from The News

I took a different kind of vacation this month. In many respects, it was like a typical Washingtonian vacation. Beach house rental in North Carolina, two elementary school kids enjoying the water - lots of seafood, sunscreen, and videos. Like many people working in and around the Congress, unplugging from email is hard, yet I largely succeeded for a week. But here was the novel experiment: I also took a vacation from The News.

All my news alerts were turned off. All enewsletters were automatically shuttled to a subdirectory in my email software which was never opened. And when I went to the grocery store during the week, and an offending headline from the newsstand attempted to infect my field of view, I averted my eyes. I went cold turkey on anything that was happening in the world.

My colleagues didn’t think I had it in me, and I confess, I understand why. I am a news-aholic. I have every alert set up for my phone, tablet, three computers from every conceivable news source - from Fox News to NPR. Before the trip I did a test and logged how many times I checked news daily. I counted 15-20 times the day before I went on the wagon.

This experiment was intended not only to see what it was like not to read, watch, and consume news, it also was intended to replace the content with a healthier diet for my brain. So, I brought three books with me on the trip, and every time I had the craving for a current event, I opened one of the books.

It was a balanced diet which included fiction, Earnest Hemingway’s “Old Man and the Sea.” (Note to self: do NOT read books that involve sharks when vacationing on the beach.) This was supplemented by an engaging book on management practices, and a wonderful book recommended by my pastor on spirituality. With the project thoroughly designed and resourced, it began!

I was surprised at how quickly the craving for The News dissipated. It was toughest in the first 12 hours. I’d say to myself, “I’m sure the House Intelligence Committee Chair and Ranking Member are quarreling over something I MUST know about!” Yet, at each urging I grabbed one of the trinity of scribes I had assembled and my mind was quickly enthralled.

We don’t realize how The News interrupts our thoughts, invades our work space, and replaces our agenda. Think about it: how many of you have been in a meeting with a coworker and your news alert goes off. It includes some astonishing quote or activity - perhaps just as or more astonishing than any other activity which has been par for the course during these past few years “Do you believe what he just said?” And suddenly the meeting agenda is lost, and you and your colleague discuss this latest tangent.

This is more than a distraction - it’s a detour from normal life. You are no longer consuming the news; The News is consuming you.

As the week continued, my dialogue with my follow travelers changed. The topic of conversation was not centered upon, “Did you see this interesting thing in the paper today?” Instead, I asked my 12-year old son, “Why do you think your graduation from elementary school was so special?” We talked about Moments, not moments.

Perhaps all of this sounds trite. Of course checking out of the day-to-day activities of the world forces us to contemplate greater forces in our lives. But here is the challenge for those of you about to embark on vacation in August: just try it. Use the days you’ll depart our capital city and REALLY let it go. Turn off The News. Pick three book, of a diverse nature, and swap them in whenever the craving for silly, daily occurrences seemingly beckon your attention.

I got home last week and realized we forgot to put a vacation stop on our newspaper. My neighbor watching our cat had brought them in my house and dutifully removed the newspapers from their plastic wrapping and laid them out in my front hallway. With all due respect and apologies to my beloved local paper, it will be a short walk to take them from my hallway to the recycling bin in the garage.