I'll admit I was already a bit frazzled before we even left Gatwick. My partner had entrusted me with one job: print the boarding passes. I did. I also left them on the kitchen table, next to the kettle, where I'd been admiring them with a cuppa. We discovered this in the taxi, approximately twelve minutes from home. The driver, a lovely man from Croydon, found it hilarious. I did not, though I can see the funny side now, sat here on a sun lounger with a cold beer and absolutely nowhere to be.

The flight to Murcia was mercifully short, and the hire car process only involved one minor argument about insurance excess. By mid-afternoon we were winding through Los Alcazares, a little town on the Mar Menor that I'd never heard of until my partner found this place online. The salt lagoon glimmered in the distance, flat and impossibly blue, and I finally felt that holiday heaviness settle into my shoulders.

Our villa sat down a quiet residential street, all whitewash and terracotta, with a private pool that caught the afternoon light like a promise. I won't lie, I practically ran to fling my suitcase on the bed and get into my swimmers. The mishap with the boarding passes already felt like it belonged to another person, some anxious commuter I'd left behind on the M23.

That first evening, we walked to the local Mercadona for provisions. I say provisions; we bought crisps, cheap Rioja, and enough fresh bread to feed a small village. The woman at the till seemed unbothered by our lack of Spanish, which was fortunate given that mine extends to "cerveza" and "gracias." We ate on the terrace as the sun went down, watching the sky turn that particular Spanish pink that makes you wonder why you don't live here permanently. I mentioned this. My partner reminded me that I don't speak Spanish and would struggle with the bureaucracy. Fair point.

The days since have settled into a rhythm so lazy it barely qualifies as a rhythm. Morning coffee by the pool, a slow wander to the beach for a paddle in the warm, shallow waters of the lagoon. The Mar Menor is strange and wonderful, more like a giant salt bath than the sea, and you can wade out for ages without it reaching your waist. I've been reading the same novel for four days, which tells you everything about my pace. It's a thriller, supposedly. Someone's probably been murdered several chapters ago. I wouldn't know. I keep dozing off.

Yesterday we ventured as far as the local market, where I bought a hat I didn't need and some olives that tasted of proper Spain, all garlic and sunshine. That was our big outing. The afternoon saw me horizontal again, floating in the pool with my ears underwater, listening to nothing but my own breathing. I thought about how I'd arrived in such a state of doing, of lists and deadlines and that ridiculous printer incident, and how quickly the body remembers how to simply be. It doesn't take much, really. A bit of warmth, a bit of quiet, and permission to slow down that you have to give yourself because nobody else will.

Tonight we'll probably stroll to one of the beachfront restaurants, the ones with plastic chairs and grilled sardines and cold beer served without ceremony. Nothing fancy. Nothing that requires planning or printed documents. Just the simple pleasure of being somewhere else, doing very little, and finding that it is absolutely enough.