there is currently a rooster living on our property named chocolate dog hole.

his previous name was water bottle, which was already a strange choice, but at least i could see the logic because i’m 99% sure henry named him right after telling me he was thirsty.

chocolate dog hole has no discernible logic and henry (age three) will not be taking any questions at this time.

i tell myself this is one of those things i will remember forever. although, i have finally given into the fact that i probably won’t and started keeping a journal with dates and one-liners of henry-isms i want to remember. [10/10 recommend.]

because those little things usually aren’t the things that feel important enough to remember while they’re happening. they’re not particularly beautiful. they’re not the kind of thing you’d think to write down in your family history books. and no one is going to look at a photograph of a rooster named chocolate dog hole and think, ah yessssss, THIS is the good stuff.

but it feels important to me because it happened to us. and i think those might be the things we eventually miss the most.

i recently went to the cape to visit my grandma with henry and my mom, which i kept calling a vacation because that is what you call a trip to the where you eat ice cream, meet grandma’s pet duck (yes, she has a duck that comes when she calls), eat lunch on the beach, and sleep somewhere that is not your house.it was a lovely trip.

we saw seals. we ate lobster every day. henry did the particular kind of three-year-old vacationing where you can spend an entire afternoon having a wonderful time and then find yourself standing in a parking lot negotiating exactly how many rocks can come in the car with you (we landed on one for each hand and each cup holder).

because when you have a three-year-old, you don’t reallyyyy go on vacation. you go somewhere else and do your regular job there.

you still wake up at exactly 6:57am. you still make sure there are plenty of emergency snacks in your three different bags. you still locate their missing shoe for the third time. you still argue with a very small person about whether pants are, in fact, necessary.

i came home from the cape and felt a disproportionate exhaustion that made me wonder why i was so tired after a vacation.

and then i realized: oh. because it wasn’t rest. it was a trip.

i’ve been doing this in other little ways, too. calling things restful because they are beautiful, or calling them breaks because they are different, or assuming that if something is enjoyable, it must also be restorative.

sometimes it isn’t… and that’s fine. the important part is the realization (and subsequent expectation adjustment).

i think that’s why getting home felt so good, even though we’d just been away somewhere beautiful.

home is where the routines that can feel tedious are also the routines that hold you up. where you know exactly where the snacks are. how the washing machine works. where bedtime happens where, at the end of the day, you don’t have to figure out how to make everyone comfortable in a room that isn’t yours.

and it got me thinking about what we decide is worth remembering.

we tend to think the things worth remembering are the things that feel special while they’re happening. the big trip. the perfect beach day. the birthday where everyone is happy in every photograph.

but a lot of the things we eventually ache for are the things that were not restful, glamorous, or particularly remarkable.

the kid refusing pants.
the sandy car. (okay maybe not the sandy car.)
the rooster with a deranged name.
four generations in one small cottage on a marsh.
the exact shape of a yearly trip.

because the truth is, i don’t think i’ll remember the cape because it was relaxing. i’ll remember it because henry was three. because my mom was there holding his hand in the waves. because my aunt made a last-second trip down to drink wine and eat oysters with us. because my grandma’s cottage has that particular smell of my childhood vacations, too. because this was what our week looked like for a few days in september, and there won’t ever be another september quite like this one.

the things we eventually miss aren’t always the things we were most grateful for while they were happening. sometimes they’re just the things that were ours.

even the exhausting parts.
even the ordinary parts.
even the rooster named chocolate dog hole.

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