After spending time with Jon’s high school buddy, staying 10 days in Cloud 9 while Hampshire’s interior was painted, visiting Jon’s mom for Mother’s Day, and two weekends at home recovering and doing follow-up projects, we finally got back to the basics: a weekender at Loyd Park.

We arrived at mid-afternoon and set up camp, enabling Jon to “work from home” for the remainder of the day. Meanwhile, Cliff unpacked and made ready our Date Night cocktail hour. Although temperatures were in the high-80s, we enjoyed our steak dinner under the pavilion, thanks to low humidity and a gentle breeze.

Saturday found us pursuing our typical routines: watching “CBS Saturday Morning,” reading The New York Times, enjoying breakfast cocktails. Jon spent time finalizing his department e-newsletter. Cliff made brunch. We napped. Chef Cliff prepared bone-in pork chops, steamed broccoli, cob corn, and baked beans. We spent time talking to one of Cliff’s friends from the seminary, and then took a long walk under the Strawberry Moon.

Sunday morning brought more of the same: reading, relaxing, recharging. We read an excellent opinion piece by Jessica Grose in The New York Times about the growing popularity of the phrase “doing the work” on social media. Its association with self-actualization implies that “our big issues in life are simple and clear-cut, that everyone agrees on what they are and that the only reason a problem hasn’t been solved is because somebody isn’t working hard enough.” Like the author, we decline to do more work. If tending to our minds and souls is yet another job, another box to check, another task to optimize and conquer, then we’re not interested. “Learning, growing and repairing rifts with other humans — and within one’s own soul or psyche — is a messy business, one that transcends the temporal tidiness of a job; you can’t clock in and out of it,” she says.

It could be argued that these weekenders give us the time and space to engage more deeply with our inner selves. Listening to birdsong or watching the sun set can be meditative, even more so when taken together and as a shared experience.

Our lives have changed since we last visited Loyd Park. Maya received a diagnosis of diabetes, which necessitates regular insulin injections every day at 6:30 am and again 12 hours later. Cliff and Jon treat her together, with Cliff injecting the insulin while Jon distracts her with a cracker. Regimented feeding times, even on the weekends, means no more sleeping in (a discipline more daunting for Cliff than Jon). But, after nearly four weeks, it’s now a part of our routine.