Where Was the Birthplace of the American Vacation? Vituperation/Thesis
It always baffles me that there is such a thing as an “ American vacation”. I have always thought of vacation as an essential part of the colonist mindset, one where your history colonizing has given you the privilege to not work. On vacation people tend to shut down and shut out – we escape to a better place and we often follow the direction of others to figure out how we should be enjoying the time we have with ourselves or loved ones. Two conflicting mindsets are apparent in the advent of vacation: one where your history of colonization has led you to a point where you no longer need to work and one where you’re using the direction of others to put you in a place not to work. You would think that if you had the privilege of a colonizer, you would know the peaks and the valleys of the lands you’ve colonized; you would assume that all those years colonizing would provide you and your descendants with the knowledge of the land you own, so much so that your escape into it wouldn’t so much be a vacation, but rather a hike. Instead, Americans are so easily able to venture off into the woods of the Adirondack Mountains, believing they are replenishing their souls in nature, only to colonize the mountains again. Americans use vacation as another form of profit, taking away the sublime of nature and any human connection to it. Soon after the bulldozers have taken over another mountain, or another beach, or another valley, Americans will flock and bathe themselves in the profit and dream of being somewhere and doing something. America’s unrelenting want to control has made nature and the sublime a bore: not many people truly want to expose themselves to nature, but would rather follow in the footsteps of another hoping to capture a piece of their happiness. This mindset of following in another’s footsteps to capture a piece of their happiness makes the American vacation sound lazy and unappreciative of the act of becoming apart of nature The mindset of a colonizer is lazy yet efficient – if I can go somewhere, I can take anything and turn a profit, in the hopes that one day I can do nothing somewhere else. It is unforgiving the American Vacation: a true representation of America’s insatiable need to control.