The Beach - Day 5

Bee Gees Song of the Day: Love You Inside and Out

Don't try to tell me it's all over
I can't hear a word, I can't hear a line
No man could love you more
and that's what I'm crying for
You can't change the way I feel, inside

I left off here:

I took out my notepad and started writing about the day. I offered up a few brief prayers that the kids would make it back without incident.

And I fell asleep.

That's where I last left off. Soundly asleep after a lovely day having spent time with my kids.

Time Stamp: 2:36 am, Wednesday August 15, 2007

My phone rings. "Mom. The car broke down."

"Where are you?" six and a half hours later, he was nowhere close.

"Just south of Washington DC. It's totally broken down Mom, I don't know what to do."

I was up and out of bed immediately. It eventually turned out alright. Fortunately, one of the kids had AAA. They got towed to a commuter lot where they slept in the car. When the woke up in the morning, they walked to a rental car agency, rented a car and got home. Old car junked, new car purchased. No one was hurt. Not getting back home in time for certain commitments caused a bit of a headache, but again, no one was hurt. They'll have a great road story to tell one day.

Point is, no parent wants to get that call. Nothing good comes out of a 2:30 am call from anyone. I've had three calls like that; the first was the worst. A 6am call from my mom saying that my dad was dead. No good. Second call was literally days after my ex had moved out of the state. 12:30 am, "Hello, Ma'am? This is the Montgomery County Sheriff's Office." I could feel the blood drain out of my body instantly. "EVERYTHING IS OK, but I have your 14 year old son here. He was loitering with some friends..." Nooooooo good at all. And then this 2:30 am. call. Had the kids been a little closer, I would have immediately gotten in the car and picked them up. My Uncle, who lived a half hour away from the kids offered to do that, bless him.

After that, the day was a relaxed one. I napped later in the morning, sat out on the deck slogging through "Wicked". The kids made it back to New York safely, which was a relief. I worked on a crossword with my cousin and then we all went out to dinner. The younger contingent were whisked off to an arcade and miniature golfing, I went back and had an early night. Ahhh, for the joys of vacation.

When one didn't have a knot in one's stomach with anxiety.

The Beach - Days 3 and 4

Bee Gees Song of the Day: Melody Fair

Who is the girl with the crying face, looking at millions of signs?
She knows that life is a running race.
Her face shouldn't show any lines.

Slept in on day three; until 7am. Looking back on my notes it seemed like an extraordinarily boring day. I walked Buddy, helped with breakfast, no doubt made a bit more progress on the dreadfully Winkie political “Wicked”. I believe I did go in the water and was wrestled mercilessly by my son. I executed the “Jewel of the Nile” move and the boy did not harass me again.

I also made note in my journal that there was sand everywhere. In places sand had no business being.

The notable quote of the day came from one of the college kids. They had stocked up fully on beer and one of the youths had obviously made a significant dent in the case by 5pm. A little louder than usual, a little more emboldened by the alcohol. As resident mother to these young adults, I felt it was my duty to see the young man rest up a bit before continuing on his path toward total physical and mental annihilation. I brought him upstairs and required that he lay down for a period of time; before we started more games. He complained that my edict was unfair. I tried to explain that we should all try to pace ourselves.

“I have been pacing myself. I’ve been pacing myself ALL DAY.”

An engaging political discussion followed dinner, heated at times, but full of fascinating thoughts and insights. I enjoyed that very much. Games followed. Much fun was had by all.

Apparently, my time near the Atlantic had made me occasionally reflective. I had been a great letter writer in my youth, but I now live in an age where I can type faster than I can think and thoughts can be set to paper and erased just as immediately. And so day four of my journal found me lamenting the art of the handwritten letter. I noted that today, everything was an email, or an instant message. All abbreviated thoughts on an electronic canvas.

I might expand on that. I might wax poetic on our collective loss in the art writing. How we have compressed our thoughts into, “oic. Lv u 2 brb” I might. But I won’t.

Day four was a bad beach day for me. I started out wanting to fly a kite and twisted my ankle. (Anyone who knows me knows that my ankles sprain themselves with malice aforethought while I’m in my sleep, so this was not a shocker). Because I felt like throwing up, I decided to walk it off by going into the waves. The gods of the ocean were having their way with me that day because I then smashed my thumb on a boogie board and jammed it. My children laughed at me. As I eventually attempted to get out of the water, Neptune toyed with me still more by knocking me off my feet. My right ankle hurt and my left thumb throbbed, making it hard for me to get up. Adam, the little bastard, never one to let opportunity pass, noted that I was in a weakened state, reached over to help and knocked me in again, forcing more f*cking sand into places that wept over the indignity. No doubt to punish me over yesterday’s slick “Jewel of the Nile” move I executed with accuracy.

I gathered my things about me and limped away.

Lunch with the kids; it was their last day at the beach and their intended departure time was 8pm. I took them out to dinner to “The Lucky Fisherman”; a very good seafood buffet on the island. When I came back, I found that someone had locked the door to the beach house and my keys were inside. Nothing I could do there, so I helped the kids clean up their cabin “Down Under”. They enjoyed one last walk on the beach, and then they took off, right on schedule. I choked back some emotion, Meg and I walked out on the dock and talked a while. We then proceeded to go back to the locked beach house and broke in by methods better left between us. We got in. All was well.

I took out my notepad and started writing about the day. I offered up a few brief prayers that the kids would make it back without incident.

And I fell asleep.

The Beach - Day 2

Bee Gees Song of the Day: Alone

I could hear you breathing
With a sigh of the wind
I remember how your body started trembling
Oh, what a night it's been
And for the state I'm in
I'm still alone

Day two was a little more non-descript. My body was still on work time and I woke up at 5:00 am. It was dark out, a quiet reminder that summer is almost at an end and that I should enjoy it now. I walked Buddy. He hated the water and the waves; they made him very nervous. He stayed with the dried up sea-fodder that had washed up on the beach and nosed around in that.

I kept trying to get into the book I had brought with me; "Wicked". Well written, but I wasn't feeling the love. After a morning on the beach, Meg and I had lunch with the Adam and the kids at their house. They made hot dogs and bratwursts, all washed down with beer. Naps for all.

Things got more interesting in the evening. Kathryn's beach house became Irish Car Bomb Central just prior to dinner. I'm not a fan of the car bomb. The Baileys curdles and it's an effing big glass o' beer. And somehow, whenever I consume one I never get tipsy, I just get a belly ache. Colleen, on the other hand, is Northern Virginia's Irish Car Bomb Chugging Amateur Champion and her always gregarious demeanor expands still more after a competition. She is the queen. But as happens with champs, young upstarts are forever swaggering into town, aiming to shove you off of your throne, attempting to claim the title.

Tommy had been practicing.

The boys lined up; Adam, Tom, Bill, and Chris all stood toe to toe with Colleen at the counter. Guinness was poured, shot glasses were at the ready. 1, 2, 3 – BAM. Colleen's glass hit the counter. The champ retained the belt. Tommy came in a respectable second.

The women in the room were encouraged to take the champ on; surely she couldn't win twice in a row. Crap. OK, Guinness was poured, shot glasses were at the ready. 1, 2, 3 – BAM. Colleen's glass hit the counter. The champ retained the belt. I came in a respectable second.

With a belly ache as my friend for the rest of the night.

Kathryn attempted to soothe the pain later in the evening by concocting a lemon drop for me with the ingredients at hand. I tried to be game, I really did. The shot went down fine, but the monster in my gut assimilated it and it became one with the belly ache.

After dinner, we all decided it was time to play games. Guesstures, Cranium, Pictionary, Scene It!, were our choices. The play of the night came early during Guesstures when one team member, who I will not identify here, (but it was NOT me!) attempting to extract the word "Bovine" from the team, in a strange and horrible para-onanistic act, simulated a cow being milked.

Pictures were taken. It was not pretty.

The Beach - Day 1

Bee Gees Song of the Day: Monday's Rain

In this my life , I walk in light
You are my love so baby I'm all right
Don't let me down , baby
Don't let me down

I have divested my orifices of most of the sand that offended. My clothes are washed and put away. My toiletries are back in my, well, toilet. Buddy is back in his crate. The color I so carefully cultivated on the beach is already fading.

Back from the beach. Back to work. Back to life in real time.

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We headed out Saturday morning at 5am. My daughter, never an early riser by choice, was only moderately bitter. She craved Dunkin' Donuts. Our little slice of northern Virginia suburbia has a half dozen Starbucks but no Dunkin Donuts. I had awakened at 3:30 am and walked Bud-Man. Since I am not a night person, I packed the bag, made the bed, washed the dishes, turned off the main water valve, unplugged the computer, shut off the air conditioning, brought in the lawn furniture and packed food. And was ready dead on at 5am. I was already sweaty.

The beach train left at roughly 5:15 am when my cousin Colleen and her children pulled up in their van. Meg and I turned on the Sirius radio and, as tradition dictates, we turned on Radio Classics. After finding a Dunkin' Donuts to satisfy Meg's craving, we shoved off for real.

Meg and I were vastly entertained by "The Shadow"; one of the most popular shows in radio history. Titled "Spider Boy", this particular episode centered on a lonely fella who liked to sew. Having no friends he keenly laments his bad luck. He befriends a spider who is weaving her silken web of death in the corner. Spider Boy later preys on the one hapless female who enters his field of vision and further haplessly makes eye contact with him. He wants her to become his girlfriend, and he loves her. She continues to be hapless.

After having haplessly killed his arachnid-lady-friend, our girl escapes Spider Boy's clutches of peril, but lands in a hospital bruised and catatonic. The Shadow (wealthy man about town, Lamont Cranston) eventually finds out where Spider Boy lives and tells him he's insane. Completely mad and in an effort to "Show them!" Spider Boy grabs some yarn, spins it out the window believing it is the iron yarn of victory and falls haplessly to his death.

Best line of the program was when Lamont Cranston and his gal pal Margo Lane go to talk to the catatonic girl's father. It is apparent by his sleazy Bronx accent that Dad has smacked is daughter around in the past, just as a matter of course, and is rather braggadocios about it:

"Your daughter is the hospital, sir, and it looks like she has been beaten to death!"

"Oh yeah? Well maybe she needed a beatin'."

Meg and I are still repeating that line. And we laugh every time.

It was probably the best part of the trip down. No air conditioning makes for swell mileage, but a very long 7 ½ hours. We all stopped to fuel up (I was only at half a tank, but what the hey) and utilize the facilities in some section of the country that I'm pretty certain is called South Bumf*ck. Practically in the middle of a pasture just off the highway, this little convenience store was obviously not being visited by secret shoppers. There were a couple of large men towing a trailer standing by the ladies' room door, causing my daughter's paranoia radar to ping. I went to the ladies' room first. I was not raped, but my other senses were violently assaulted.

Now I grew up on a farm. I actually love the smell of cow manure; it reminds me of my dad (so does freshly mown and baled grass). We had pigs on that farm and "Nothin' smells worse than a pig," to quote my cousin John. My point is, I can tolerate bad smells. The rank stench hovering at the level of my mouth inside that hot bricked up excuse for an outhouse was vile and seconded only by the filth covering the toilet seat. I stood up to use the facilities and warned others of the restroom of menace. I wanted to vomit. I walked Buddy while the rest of the crew utilized the stink-barns and we were back on our way.

My son Adam was bringing down three friends as sort of a last fling before their senior year of college started. We were in close contact as they had started the long journey from upstate New York at 11pm the evening before. Yeah, no, don't ask. I don't want to talk about their decisions. I just kept telling myself that they are young and it was an adventure for them. They had virtually no issues on the trip down.

We arrived at the beach houses at about 12:30 pm. We eventually checked in and unpacked. My version of unpacking is opening up my suitcase. It keeps it simple.

The evening turned out fabulously; Colleen had made several gallons of her famed sangria and she was partnered with Billy. Red wine was uncorked and the Bud Light flowed pretty freely. We played cards; Pitch to be precise. I am really a very poor card player, probably because of the math that is involved. But I lucked out with my partner Tommy. I learned a few things from my ex-husband; one of them was to always bet two when you have an ace, and the other was if you have more than 2 cards in the same suit, bet three. No matter what. I made a couple of great plays, Tommy made a bad decision when he outbid my three, and we lost four, but we eventually came back to win the game.

Having drained the sangria, the crew feasted on "Booze Fruit" and Colleen declared Billy her b*tch.

It was a wonderful start to the week.