29 July 2026
Vacations aren't just a way to take a break from work. They're a way to imagine, for a few weeks, a different version of our lives.
The same phenomenon repeats itself every summer. Destinations change, fashions change, and the photos filling social media change, but the mechanism remains surprisingly stable: millions of people set out in search of something that often doesn't coincide with their chosen vacation spot.
We're not just looking for the sea, the mountains, or a city to visit. We seek a distance from work, from habits, schedules, and the responsibilities that dictate the rest of the year.
The very idea of vacation arises from this need. Not so much the need to rest, but rather the need to temporarily break a routine. For a few days, behaviors that would seem out of place in everyday life become acceptable. We sleep at different times, we eat differently, we spend entire afternoons without a precise plan. Even the way we dress changes.
For this reason, vacations have always had a strong imaginary dimension. They don't simply represent a geographical move. They are a mental space in which to experiment with different possibilities. Some last the duration of a trip, others remain mere fantasies, but both respond to the same need: to momentarily escape the role we occupy during the rest of the year.
The tourism industry has built a significant part of its success around this very desire. The images accompanying hotels, resorts, and destinations rarely show just a place. They show a promise. The promise of a simpler, freer, more intense, or slower life.
Of course, we know that this is, at least in part, a construction. No vacation can radically transform a person in a matter of days. Yet we continue to search for that elsewhere.
In a society that tends to define individuals through profession, productivity, and responsibility, summer continues to represent one of the few moments in which this definition can be temporarily put on hold. Not erased, but suspended.
This is probably where the enduring appeal of vacations lies. Not in the escape from reality, as is often claimed, but in the possibility of observing it from a different perspective. Stepping away allows us to better see what we normally take for granted.
This is why returning from vacation often brings with it an ambiguous feeling. On the one hand, the desire to preserve something of the experience just lived, on the other, the awareness that the parenthesis is closing. And perhaps it's precisely this fragility that makes it so precious. Knowing it won't last long makes us long for it every year with the same intensity. Not because we hope to become someone else, but because we need, at least for a few weeks, to remind ourselves that we could be.
