Yesterday, I ran and hiked around the local lake here. It's a 4-mile dirt trail loop around and as gorgeous as any trail in Northern Virginia. I have not been going around the lake that much lately and it was so nice to experience the sun peek low through the trees at sunset. When time and plans and dinner plans start to crunch in on your "me time" it's a sign that you need the me time more than ever. Even as I got out of the car, turned on my Strava app to count my miles I could still not shake this feeling that I should be elsewhere, doing something more important, for someone other than me.
This feeling, this guilt that I should be doing something else, BE someplace else is almost as old as I am. It could be a Latino thing. Parents, and overall the larger Latino community drill it hard into their younger generations that one must remain close by when you become an adult. Funny, I do not recollect one conversation, one interaction, in which this creed would have been passed down to me, yet, it's there, as present and living as when I was a kid. It takes every ounce of me to get past these invisible strings that make no sense or have no distinct origin. I will give myself some credit though; at age 48 I can say I have learned to stop those guilty feelings from dominating my life. But it does say something about the power of these "suggestions" in that I can stop their effects but I have yet to know how to stop them from popping up every time I am going to indulge in any way.
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