Nearest and Dearest: vacation

Showing posts with label vacation. Show all posts

Monday, April 4, 2011

Renewal

It's late and I sit typing at the laptop. The one I swore I wouldn't do any work on, on our vacation. But this isn't work I tell myself. It's our story-the one I haven't had time to write for so long.

Vacation. I needed this time so badly. I could feel myself start to unravel in the last two months or so. It seems like I do everything just a little bit, enough to get by but not enough to finish or flourish.

I kept telling myself that I shouldn't get too excited because vacation is often very overrated. You make so many plans and they don't all happen. But I couldn't help myself. I needed this vacation so badly I could feel myself willing to hold on, to just get to April Fool's Day when at 4:00 I would be free to spend 9 whole days with my family. Where we wouldn't be rushed or harried or impatient. Where we could linger over breakfast and sleep late.

At approximately 2:30 on April 1st, I opened an email from Bud and read the words that signified an end to my vacation dreams. His boss's wife had been sent to the hospital to await the arrival of their first child. While I certainly did not begrudge them this happy day, I felt the sharp sting of disappointment because I knew he wasn't coming with us.

All my daydreams of rest and enjoying my family were rapidly disappearing. Instead I was about to embark on a 5 1/2 hour ride with three children, one of whom spends the entire time complaining about how her bottom hurts from sitting so long and "are we there yet?' Who was going to lug the beach chairs, the towels, the coolers, the boogie boards, the skim board, the umbrella to the beach with me? Who would I have to talk to and joke with?

I couldn't back out of the trip so the girls and I packed up and came anyway. It has been a challenge to figure out how to get everything unloaded into the condo and go for groceries and take them swimming and "oh mom I forgot my toothbrush, can we go buy one" but somehow I managed and finally this morning found myself parked in a chair in the sand, watching the girls dodge the waves and ride their boogie boards, listening to the sound of the surf.

And finally in that moment, I felt myself take a deep breath and relax. The sound of the ocean relaxes me. I feel myself slowing down, reveling in and enjoying the small things, enjoying my girls.

This for me is renewal. My goal this week to simply relax and unwind. And oh, maybe just maybe catch up on all my old blog posts that beg to written and I have never found the time for.

Thursday, December 2, 2010

The Chattanooga Choo Choo

Is that the Chattanooga choo choo?
Track twenty-nine
Boy, you can gimme a shine
I can afford
To board a Chattanooga choo choo
I've got my fare
And just a trifle to spare

You leave the Pennsylvania Station 'bout a quarter to four
Read a magazine and then you're in Baltimore
Dinner in the diner
Nothing could be finer
Than to have your ham an' eggs in Carolina

When you hear the whistle blowin' eight to the bar
Then you know that Tennessee is not very far
Shovel all the coal in
Gotta keep it rollin'
Woo, woo, Chattanooga there you are

There's gonna be
A certain party at the station
Satin and lace
I used to call "funny face"
She's gonna cry
Until I tell her that I'll never roam
So Chattanooga choo choo
Won't you choo-choo me home?
Chattanooga choo choo
Won't you choo-choo me home?

Not quite the Chattanooga Choo Choo

When I was a little girl, we drove to Florida on vacation. On the way we passed through Chattanooga, Tennessee. My brother and I begged to be allowed to go on the Incline Railroad and my dad was so-o-o-o close to letting us do it but my stepmother was scared that the train would break loose and we would all die so we didn't get to go.

Thirty plus years later and I finally got the opportunity to ride that railroad with my girls and my husband on a fall weekend get away in October.

Though if the truth be told I might have thought we were going to die. It is a long way up is all I have to say.

The website touts the following about the railroad:

"Known as “America’s Most Amazing Mile,” The Incline’s trolley-style cars climb

through the natural beauty surrounding historic Lookout Mountain at a breathtaking

72.7% grade – straight up! Sit back, relax and enjoy the scenic views of the mountains and

valleys from the observation windows on the train"

Bud and the the oldest and the youngest might have enjoyed a relaxing ride on the way up and the way down. However Abby and I sat together gripping our seats (and each other) with white knuckles as I tried to calculate just how far the railway car would fly when the brakes didn't work and we came careening down.

We finally made it to the top only to be shown that there are multiple braking systems and some very powerful mechanisms that make the Incline Railroad cars go. I felt kind of foolish for a second but decided if you were not scared at all then you were probably more foolish than I.

I will have to say though that the view from the top was absolutely worth the ride. My grandparents came here on their honeymoon and stood on top of this very mountain.

The weekend trip was complete with dinner at Sticky Fingers, incredible barbecue an ice cold Coca, Cola, and lights out at the Chattanoogan.

Wonderful trip. Wonderful Memories. We will definitely be back!!

Tuesday, April 13, 2010

The Perfect Vacation

I love vacations. I live for vacations. I start planning the next vacation as I am winding up the current vacation.

The truth is though that I am often disappointed by vacation.

I have it built up in my mind of how it will be, where we will go, what we will see and do and eat. And when it doesn't occur the way I think that it should, I am disappointed.

That said, we just returned from the best vacation ever to the beach.

It was the perfect vacation because quite simply, I put no expectations on this trip. I didn't plan our days, I didn't decide on an itinerary or what "we absolutely had to do."

We went to the beach and we went with the flow. We slept in late, we ate in and out as the mood struck us, we read books on the beach, played in the waves, swam in the pool, we cuddled on the lounge chairs on our balcony and listened to the sounds of the ocean, we strolled through Seaside. It was wonderful and I am dreaming of when we can go back.