Experiment brings break from work, connection to family

When I was young, I didn't always like family reunions.

I loved seeing my cousins and other close family members, but I was shy around more distant relatives whose names I couldn't remember. The entertainment often consisted of slideshows (real, old-school slides, loaded into a tray on a projector and shown on a pull-down screen), which wasn't exciting for a kid. And as a picky eater, the food could also be, ahem, challenging for me.

But as I prepared for a recent trip to my hometown of Yankton, S.D., and then to Kansas City, Kan., to see many of my family members and friends, I was quite excited. In part, that was because it was my first real vacation in quite a while. More importantly, I couldn't wait to see people I genuinely enjoy and love.

And beyond that, I was looking forward to conducting a little experiment.

I've written before in this column about how hard it is for me to disconnect from work when I'm out of the office. I get so many emails every day that I hate to let them pile up. And I usually can't resist giving an answer when someone poses a question.

But this time, I decided I was going to take a real break from work and focus on my family. That meant I needed to prepare.

I started by leaving detailed, step-by-step instructions for my co-workers on duties they'd need to cover for me while I was gone. On most trips in the past, I would just fire up my laptop from my parents' house or a hotel and take care of some of those jobs remotely. But this time, I decided I needed to be disciplined and trust my colleagues.

It turns out that was the easy part. I knew the duties I described would be managed perfectly by my talented friends at work, and I was correct.

What proved more difficult was avoiding the email checks that tend to drag me into the little office "emergencies" I was trying to leave behind for a few days.

I confess to feeling guilty having fun while my co-workers are struggling with a particularly busy day, made more difficult by my absence. It's hard not to jump in and offer an opinion or lend a hand from afar, just to lighten the load.

So, before I left on my recent trip, I vowed to cut way back on checking email. I would still go through it and clear things out every few hours, but I wasn't going to meddle in activities back at the office.

As I put this plan into action, you'll never guess what I discovered. Shockingly, those little emergencies were resolved without my input. I may have been able to help had I been there, but everyone seemed to get along just fine in my absence.