Tag Archives: Vacation

We Will Go on a Cruise

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“We will go on a cruise, when we have the time!”  This pronouncement from my mother made me frustrated and even more impatient than my 18-year-old self could actually handle, which is to say, I began to whine.  i must say that the whining did pay off, as within six months we were on a massive ship in the Caribbean visiting 3 or 4 ports of call, including Jamaica.

At eighteen, this is not only a vacation, but on the best adventures.  I was “officially” graduated from Disney rides, and allowed to sip Bloody Mary’s and have a bottle of Corona.  I almost had a room to myself–I shared a cabin with my sister.

Every day was get up late day…  And because the late I preferred was noon–lunchtime, I missed being in the main dining room, which was only open to any public for breakfast.  For lunch, I often wandered into the buffet, as well as one of the cafes on a few of the other decks.  I welcomed getting up late as the feeling that the sun is always shining is absolutely the one feeling I wan, especially if I am on vacation.  This made it possible to run out to the pool deck for the afternoon, if there wasn’t some show or movie on.  My sister and I would share a cocktail, just before meeting our parents and a couple of other friends who had come with our parents.  Sometimes, it was easier to pay for a bottle of Corona and avoid the late afternoon nagging that would come from Mom and Dad…  especially in one of the several bars and lounges that were open.  This happened a few times in our two week cruise, sine the traffic continually changed, sometimes making the outdoor sundecks too crowded.  My sister and I didn’t have the money to go  to the ones with the dress code, but we made an effort to get together with the grown-ups at one of the karaoke bars anyway.

This was one of the best vacations I had ever been on, and I am young, so, you know that if I had the perspective of a more experienced cruiser, that probably this business is a good one.  To always have a water bed to sleep on is one of the luxuries I always thought belonged to the ultra-rich.  To have an experience that is related to having a lot of money and a lot of taste is like an adventure at Disney Land, for adults who love this feeling.

The fun thing about a cruise is that the fun of Disney Land and Disney World doesn’t end.  If you get bored of gambling onboard ship, you can always disembark and on land at one of the ports and go for something fun and interesting.  There are bars and restaurants and sites to see as well.  And you get to see all those buildings that could only be seen in unreal ways.

After that first trip, I have fallen in love with cruising.  It has a cult following that attracts people who like to travel, which in the past, was not as easy as getting aboard ship.  I’ve also been on the road trip…., which requires nerves of steel, if you have them.  You go and you stop and stay at absolutely any time you wish, going as far as you want, but just get back home within three weeks!

As this summer ends, we are getting ready again fro the regular business of school, and the changing of season, again.  After a break like the two months in the summer, it almost seems fun to get out big coats and sets of boots, and start to think about the fun of Halloween and Christmas.  I feel lucky to have “things” despite those people who are minimalists, who want to have very few interior decoration or things to carry  around with them.  I am not so attuned to having luck or no luck decide my life. I am very focused on having “my things” with me, when I get them.  So, in this pack rat style, I now have to clean my room.  I still have university text books, and my favorite doll from childhood.  Things that I own, and with a growing family, I must now decide, “text books” versus “daughter and son.”

I almost feel as if I am letting people cruise through my life…  Experiencing it through these objects that i have collected.  But where else, what else, can I do with these things?  Sometimes some of the things are still very useful.  My sister, in one of her “cleaning moods,” got together with her friends and made a three week yard sale, and made over  a thousand dollars. “On junk.”  At this point, even if people were to cruise through my life, like this, I am more willing to get rid of the junk than to care about being nakedly exposed.

So, welcome, please, and join the cruise.  It is an adventure of things and experiences.  Welcome!  Come All, Come One!  WE will have fun!

A Day At the Cottage

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I am thinking back to late last summer.  I am sure it was late August, and how I was driving, alone, in my car.  It was not an accident that I was alone …  And dangerously so, since the time was at the night when evidence is easily lost.  But I was not thinking of criminals accosting me just as the lucky innocent one.  I was lost in thought of the day I had spent just three hours north of Toronto at a lake-front cottage.  The fact that I was also dangerously close to the limit of blood alcohol allowed while operating a motor vehicle, did not occupy my mind or my thoughts.  I actually did not feel intoxicated.

Well, I am sure it had passed midnight.  Just before I got into my car to drive off, I could hear the crickets.  The lake gave off a warm breeze, and the smell of fresh water, as it carried a fleeting scent of wood ash from our open fire just on the shore.  We were lingering on the lawn, talking, refusing to let go of the perfect day that had miraculously been made to happen.  A lot of slow words, sudden laughs, smiles, and shifting weight, back and forth, as the group of us lingered.  We were tiring, but let the energy of sun, drink, food, and fire keep us going.

The radio was tuned to Public Radio….  The talk was long over with, and now, the music of musicians, daring and experimenting, and creating the sound, the phrasing, the pause, the surprise, of some of the jazz-like instruments used for finding musical pleasure….  Well, that was what was on the radio.  I wouldn’t know if the musicians were in fact intoxicated….  But it sounded like it.

As I remember, and mention again, I was alone in my car.  It was comfortable, having been heated by the sun all day long, the interior was now cooling in the cool wind blowing from the speed of the car on the highway.  I kept looking at the speedometer even though I kept an even pressure on the gas pedal.  It was accompanied by my gaze along the highway.  There were not, few cars, but there were in fact, quite a few cars out with me.  There were many, many trucks, out when there was less congestion.  These were the things that frightened me.  The size of the trucks, the sound of their working engines, and the fact that passing a truck felt like King Kong brushing up against me.

I was in this state, probably at three in the morning.  I did not have any pressing engagements the next morning….  And, being on vacation, I was looking forward to quiet and relaxation.  I thought I would catch up with reading, with music, with friends, and with a few new recipes that I could try in the space of a few hours.  I was thinking these thoughts, again.  The first time and the last time I had thought and reviewed my list of vacation activities was the week beforehand when I was in my office at work.  Then, I was full of hope and optimism at the coming time and I was congratulating myself on organizing myself so well so as to have everything I was planning, working out well.

I would be home in an hour.  And I was feeling relaxed, which, coincidentally, was allowing me to stay awake at this unusual hour.  As I got closer to the city, there were fewer cars on the road.  Since the highway is smoother and there is more space, I began to become brave, and stepped on the gas pedal a little deeper to rush home.  I was feeling the lateness and the more than almost twenty-four hours since I last slept.  I did note to myself that I could very well pay a speeding fine of half the cost of the food and drink spent during the day, but I also thought that I would like to be at home soon.  So, foot on gas pedal, radio on loud, and a racing heart accompanied me down the last stretch of highway towards home.

The day was great.  I loved being close to earth.  Thinking about it now, six months later, I will mortgage my home three times over, and, even, if all there is left on that lake is a piece of rock, I will buy that piece of rock, and build my cottage on it!