Moving the Holiday: An Epiphany About Intentional Choices
by Ash Verdeck | The Epiphany Effect | June 5, 2026
Last week, I worked on Memorial Day.
Not because someone forced me to. Not because I had absolutely no choice. I worked because I support sites in Canada, and their holiday calendar doesn’t align with ours. I needed to be onsite Tuesday morning, which meant Monday became a travel day.
My alarm went off early enough that it almost didn’t feel like morning at all.
At 2:30 a.m., I quietly left the house, headed for the airport, and started another work trip.
Gus is playing junior high baseball for the school team this year. His games are all mid-morning, and this one happened to be the farthest away game of the season.
This was one of those mornings where I wasn’t multitasking. I wasn’t splitting attention. I was just there.
Watching.
Taking pictures during his at-bats.
Noticing things I don’t always get to see in the rhythm of everyday life.
Travel has always been part of my role, and I’ve been fortunate for the opportunities it has created. I’ve learned from incredible teams, grown professionally, and expanded my perspective in ways I never expected.
My husband has been incredible through all of it—steady, supportive, and willing to hold down the home front when my schedule stretches.
But 2026 has been different.
This has been the busiest travel year since stepping into this role three and a half years ago. The sites I support are farther apart, the trips are longer, and the complexity has increased significantly.
And with that comes something many working parents know well, even if we don’t always say it out loud:
Guilt.
The guilt of leaving.
The guilt of choosing work.
The guilt of missing things at home.
And sometimes, the guilt of not being fully present anywhere because everything feels like it’s competing at once.
We don’t talk about that enough.
But it’s real.
So yes—I worked on Memorial Day.
But I also made a choice to move the holiday.
This Tuesday became my day.
A day to show up differently.
A day to be intentional.
A day that looked nothing like productivity—and everything like presence.
Somewhere between innings, camera in hand, something shifted.
Not dramatically. Not loudly.
Just a quiet realization.
Work-life balance might not be the right goal.
Because balance implies symmetry. Equal weight. Equal time.
And most seasons of life don’t look like that.
Sometimes work demands more.
Sometimes family needs more.
Sometimes life simply doesn’t divide evenly.
So maybe the question isn’t:
“How do I balance everything?”
Maybe it’s:
“How do I choose intentionally in the time I do have?”
Intentional time feels different than leftover time.
It feels like deciding in advance instead of reacting in the moment.
It feels like moving a holiday so you can sit in a bleacher seat on a Tuesday morning without rushing through it.
It feels like being fully there—even if it’s only for a few hours.
What I’m learning is this:
Time will rarely align itself with what matters most to us.
We have to align it ourselves.
And sometimes that means letting go of the idea that we can do it all equally well at the same time.
That Tuesday in the bleachers won’t stand out because of a scoreboard or a highlight.
It will stand out because of a decision.
A choice to be present.
A choice to move something on the calendar.
A choice to treat time as something I can intentionally shape—not just something that happens to me.
And maybe that’s the real epiphany.
Not about balance.
But about intention.
