the Holiday Gap

One thing that I’ve found that always improves my mood is reading or writing. And no, I don’t mean reading an e-book or typing up an essay on Google Docs (special thanks to Google for letting me use their resources). Having a pen and paper in hand with a cute little notebook and writing some poetry or drawing a picture is quite therapeutic, especially if you actually have the attention span for it. If you feel you’re not inclined in the field of writing or drawing, even opening up a book and skimming through some pages of a story can calm your nerves and ease your mind. Believe me, you don’t need to be artistically inclined to do that. However, as soothing as reading and writing may be, it’s sometimes hard to get lost in your head with these things when the environment around you is noisy or distracting. Believe me, I get it, I have a cat who’s more talkative than I am. This being said, nature is the best place to enjoy time to yourself. Everything within it goes about its own business while still providing beautiful scenery for you to take in and enjoy. Sometimes, it might be hard to access a spot in nature where you alone can enjoy it, but I believe climbing up a tree or even hanging out in a nearby park can still be an ideal way to escape.

Studying these kinds of habitats can also have a lasting emotional impact on you, especially when realizing how many ecosystems suffer great losses from pollution. Tons on top of tons of waste go into the ocean every year, to the point where there is an island-sized mass of plastic that just floats in the Pacific Ocean. Knowing this may make you feel hopeless, like nothing you do will reverse the insane, negative changes that people have inflicted on the environment, but even the smallest amount of help counts. Believe me, people lose their wallets at the movie theatre all the time, and as tempted as I am to just shove it in my pocket and feed into my Pokemon plushie addiction, I return the wallet to the front counter and wait for someone to claim it. It makes an enormous difference to one person, and so does cleaning the environment. Even if you walk along a public trail and pick up bits and pieces of loose trash for a few hours, you’re still directly saving plenty of animals from ending up with a tragic fate. This also just gives you a sense of fulfillment, because there’s no way you can walk back down that trail and not help but feel great about what you did.

Something I find very calming and that hits much closer to home than camping is riding bikes. Now, it doesn’t have to be just bikes, as some people prefer roller skating, skateboarding, or even riding scooters (and if you enjoy riding scooters, unironically, what are you doing with yourself?) Either way, these things help the blood pump through your body and keep you moving, while not having to focus on your steps, breathe, or complete goals. Doing these activities for fun helps you focus your mind on the environment around you and allows you to take a breath from anything else. Now, I would recommend taking nice drives on top of the hills to get extraordinary views of the city, but driving requires quite a bit of focus, especially on the people around you. You may be spacing off while you drive, but other people aren’t aware of that, so it’ll ultimately be your fault if you swerve out of your lane and cause some mentally deranged person to floor the gas and run straight into a convenience store. (if I had a nickel for every time someone drove straight through the Highland Market, I’d have two nickels, which is not a lot, but it’s strange that it happened twice.) Instead of driving, I’d recommend investing your time and energy into something more eco-friendly, that gives you the relaxation and exercise you need while still being affordable and low-risk.