Treating Ourselves

WHEN LYING IN BED at night, I sometimes hear the horn from the distant train that once took my wife and me to San Diego. We used to ride that train to its last stop, which was walking distance to our hotel. From the hotel, we would then walk to Petco Park to catch a baseball game. After the game, we’d head over to the Gaslamp Quarter and choose a nice restaurant for dinner. Then we would take a nice long stroll back to our hotel.

The next morning, we would go to our favorite restaurant, the Broken Yolk, for breakfast. The place was always packed and full of energy. It seemed like everyone knew each other. The atmosphere had an unusual feel to it. You felt like you were in a scene in a movie, waiting for the director to yell “cut.” Afterwards, we’d head to the train station for our ride home.

Until our lives were threatened by a dangerous and mysterious virus, I never realized how important those short weekend trips were to my well-being. How the trips weren’t just a chance to have some fun, but how vital it was to allow me to escape for a short while from all the pressing problems I might have had at the time.

Isabel Gillies, author of Cozy: The Art of Arranging Yourself in the World, told AARP Bulletin that “being good to yourself offers a necessary reprieve from whatever horrors threaten us from out there.” Perhaps treating yourself every so often isn’t wasteful spending after all.