To steward time well requires a crucial admission: We do not control it
I am old enough now to be in conversations in which people talk about “flunking retirement.” It is an interesting phrase. The notion of “flunking” connotes something negative. And yet, those who use the phrase often seem to say it with a touch of pride, as if this is an accomplishment—proof that they’ve avoided whatever cultural stereotype they associate with “retirement.”
Retirement, to those who pride themselves on flunking it, generally connotes the feeling of uselessness, a regret over not being urgently needed by colleagues for some important project, a sadness over being set aside. To flunk retirement, then, means not whiling the days away playing golf or taking grandchildren to the park. The retirement-flunkers still contribute to society. They are doing something they associate with calling, accomplishment, and larger purposes in the world.
I suspect that I, in the main, have tended to flunk summer. At least I’ve failed to meet the expectations of summer in industrialized, middle-class America in general, or in academia, in particular. My experience of summer never matched well the cultural associations of family vacations to National Parks, leisurely days of reading mystery novels at the beach, or even painting houses as a welcome alternative to writing scholarly articles or preparing lectures.
I am not proud of this—just stating the facts. As children, we spent our summers at the family cottage on the grounds of our denominational conference. While we did our share of swimming and water-skiing, these were never the main point. Our main responsibility was to do something edifying or useful. And so we attended—and eventually taught—Vacation Bible School; we waited on tables in the dining hall; we worked as camp counselors. I grew up surrounded by a deeply ingrained multi-generational belief in stewarding Time by filling it with purposeful activity. Summer meant more Time. Therefore, it also meant more opportunities to be useful and to get things done.
This strong sense of Time as a gift to steward intentionally and responsibly followed me into young adulthood. During graduate school I worked at a summer camp in the Adirondacks. There I wore myself out trying to prove that I was more than an academic egghead, that I really could lead canoe trips and build a campfire with three matches that would actually make possible a meal for the skeptical hungry campers looking on.
Once I had finished my dissertation (also, incidentally, written during a highly regimented summer between my first and second year of college teaching), I came to see summer as a time to catch up on all those responsibilities that could not possibly fit into the regular semesters. Mostly this meant research and writing—the part of my work as a historian that never seemed to find its way into the fall and spring semesters that were already overloaded with teaching, advising, committee work, and all the other responsibilities of a faculty member at a small liberal arts college.
Each summer began the same way: by laying out big plans for each of the approximately twelve to fourteen weeks between graduation and faculty retreat. I should add here that I looked forward to accomplishing these plans! I did not dread the work. I looked forward to the prospect of long undisturbed hours in my library cubicle or, during one season, to the several weeks of summer that I spent in Lampeter, Wales, working for days at a time on the ethics of David Hume—admittedly not most people’s idea of enjoyment or leisure!
Giving up this vast expanse of unfilled summer space that I had come to treasure as a full-time classroom professor was one of the costliest sacrifices of moving into full time academic administration. My summers became more like those of most people in the working world. Suddenly I too only got two weeks of vacation out of the office, and nothing about work stopped during my vacation.
While I never quite lost the inner rhythm of the academic year, it was when my summers became more like those of the larger world that I realized how problematic my lifelong summer habits really were. Yes, I had been fortunate to be one of those individuals whose work is inextricably intertwined with one’s person. I would have studied and written and strategized about holistic formation of students whether I was paid to do it or not! But the downside of all this integration is that none of these tasks has natural boundaries. They are never finished. There is no moment when one will feel that one has done enough.
Even more distressing was seeing the extra-fine line between seeking to be a good steward of time and living as if I was entitled to be in control of my time. There turned out to be an inexorable slide from being an organized person who could move multiple projects along simultaneously on several fronts to seeing my own worth in the good that I could do or the length of my to-do list. In the name of faithfully stewarding time, I was crowding out any space for silence, spontaneity, and surprise. I was not communicating an invitational openness to hospitality or community.
In the end, “summer,” like “retirement” is a construction of luxury—a way of dividing up time or life made possible by living in a world where there is a division of labor, and in which one no longer needs to spend every minute pursuing subsistence. We who are privileged enough to enjoy these seasons would do well to remember that they are not ours by right. In our particular context it is tempting to think we have earned these breaks by working so many weeks or so many years. But in the larger picture of space and time, they are gifts that have come to us through no merit of our own. We do not get to choose when and where we were born. Our birth, our context, our summers are all gifts of grace for which we should be thankful.
Furthermore, these conventional cultural creations of artificially unscheduled time can, if we let them, remind us of realities that should characterize every day of our lives—not just when we are on vacation. We must make mental and emotional space every day for spontaneity, for the persons or events that come to us unannounced. Life does not fall neatly into blocks of “work” and blocks of “leisure.” We do not get to schedule many of the most treasured aspects of our lives—which always involve relationships. There are times of mourning, times of unexpected joy, times when others just need us to be there.
Ultimately, our task in this world is not to maximize the good works that we can accomplish. There is no such thing as doing “enough.” Yes, we are given the opportunity to be a part of projects that utilize our gifts and draw us out of ourselves into larger purposes. But this doing is not what gives us worth and value. It is, in the end, all about grace and gift. We must learn to live with open hands, to make room to receive what comes to us rather than trying to manage the world. We are not in charge—ever.
This year, dare to receive summer’s space and time with open arms. Choose to practice what it might mean to see all of our Time as invitation, gift, and grace, allowing the joys of spontaneity and surprise to overflow into all the seasons of our lives.
Shirley A. Mullen (PhD) is President Emerita of Houghton College and longtime history professor. Her most recent book is Claiming the Courageous Middle: Daring to Live and Work Together for a More Hopeful Future (2024).