I should have known the trip was a bad idea when I threw up. Less than an hour after crossing the North Carolina border, I turned to look at Phillip and tell him I didn’t feel well. I didn’t get that far, and ended up spewing all over myself and the seat. Gross.
That event started The Converstaion, which might be the shortest in history: a couple looks, and then stony silence reigned until we hit the motel. We unloaded, and old routines took over: check-in, a quick visit to the beach, a snack, sand everywhere. We didn’t get to make a first castle that night as the sun was setting, but we did make a bit of a sand mountain. [Confession: while Dragon and I were mounding it up, visions of Close Encounters kept coming to mind and I was hoping mashed potatoes wouldn’t be on the menu.]
Passive agression, arguments on the beach, avoidance off the beach, withdrawl, weird bug bites, riptides, total freak-out experiences, bickering. By the time Wednesday afternoon rolled around I had had more than enough. And that was just the adults. In fact, the boys were excellent and seemed to tolerate the adult shenanigans with a stoicism well beyond their years. The only real part of the vacation I enjoyed were the two trips to the Aquarium. It still manages to fascinate me.
At lunch I asked the boys how they would feel if I packed everything up, headed home and took them to a nice, civilized, over-populated, wholly-commercialized water park sometime next week. Cheers resounded and we did the dishes on our way out.
Storms aplenty raged on our drive back, taking frayed nerves and pushing them to the ludicrous point. Country music, funny phone calls, and dumb jokes helped, but let me assure that we are all of us qute glad to be back in Virginia and at home. The rest of our vacation is going to be spent laughing about That Damned Vacation.
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