I have been referring to this week as my guilt-week. I know I should call it what it is – a vacation week – but the whole reason it exists is because of mommy guilt.

Early in the summer, after spending their first week or two at their school-sponsored day camp, my ten-year old started in on me.

“Why can’t you just stay home with us?” Madeline asked. “Why can’t you not work in the summer?”

She tried to convince me that if I had a different job, I could have the summers off. Some of her friends were able to stay home all summer, and they didn’t get sent to day camps. She suggested possible career changes for me – artist, jeweler, architect – that would be more conducive to having free summers. I told her that I was pretty sure most artists, jewelers, and architects also had to work in the summer months, but nice try.

I knew what she was getting at, though.

This is the third post (of four) in which I’m sharing our itinerary for our recent trip out to Jackson Hole, Grand Teton National Park, and Yellowstone National Park. The first post is here, and the second post is here – in case you missed them.

Warning: Photo-heavy post ahead.

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Days 5: Old Faithful to Mammoth

One unexpected upside to Yellowstone was the disconnection to the outside world. There were no televisions in the hotels, and WIFI (for a fee) was only available at a handful of locations in the entire 2.2 million acres. There was also no radio. We usually listen to radio in the car, but we lost the signal shortly after entering the park from the south entrance. The silence, initially palpable and deafening, was soon comfortable and expected.

Now, let me dispel any notion you may have that we rode in that stylish rental minivan for hours each day without any noise or electronic distractions.  I am not stupid. I would never travel without items to occupy my kids’ busy minds. We traveled with exactly three iPads, one laptop, and two Kindles. Frozen was on constant replay from at least one device at any given time. In between Frozen clips, the kids played Minecraft on their iPads – which are technically NOT their iPads at all but only borrowed from their parents. (Yeah, sure.)

Grand Prismatic Spring, in the Midway Geyser Basin in the Old Faithful area.

I had the rare opportunity this summer to look back on the last six years of my career as an oncologist and to reflect on where I started and where I’m headed. The experience was eye opening, motivating, and educational. It was also painful.

I work in academic medicine (some of you know this already), and in academics, the only way to be promoted up the professorial hierarchy is to prepare a promotion packet. The promotion packet is a compilation of every activity I’ve been involved in since I was hired and every accomplishment I’ve achieved along the way. I had to write it myself. This meant that I spent nearly an entire month, maybe a little longer, writing about myself, about all of the many things I’ve done and how great I am at everything – patient care, teaching, administration, and research. When I finally turned it in, my packet was around 50 pages in length, and over 15,000 words.

By the end of writing it, I was fairly sick of myself. You probably would too, if you read it.