Good Morning.
I am always interested in where people go on vacation and what they do when they reach their destination - perhaps a favorite golf course or the ocean in a warmer clime or the ski slopes during the colder season. Others are over the moon about a cruise, but there are all kinds of cruises. I have been on exactly two in my life, one a small day trip on a small barge-type vessel and the other a ten-day journey on a floating hotel. My preference at this point would be somewhere in between: one of those smaller river boats on the Danube or a paddle wheeler on the Mississippi as long as I don't have to do the ports of call where I am supposed to troop around medieval castles or Civil War battle sites. The eyes may have it but not the knees.
The primary requirement when I leave town is to find a certain tranquility. I want a comfortable chair, a good book,
and a beverage, but that doesn't mean I need those considerations in a Caribbean resort, let alone one with a swim up bar. I cannot imagine the emotional trauma of trying to propel myself across a pool the size of a football field to get a Mai Tai. At some point in life, one must acknowledge that the swim suit days are over for the sake of humanity. A dude ranch is also out because I would not be able to swing myself over a horse. The mules that take someone down into the Grand Canyon also have nothing to worry about. I would use the excuse of being afraid of heights, but the truth is that it would take a fork lift to get me onto a saddle.
I also am not interested in sharing living quarters with people I don't know. We used to go to a ski lodge with communal bunk rooms and bathrooms, and I did not enjoy the situation even when I was young and more flexible in my thinking. I just
don't do snoring and toothpaste unless I am intimately acquainted with someone. My younger son frequently travels by
train and likes meeting new people in the dining car, but that's for an hour or two, not a long weekend padding around a
lodge in long johns, a flannel robe, and a bad case of bed head.
Of course vacationing with people one knows well can also have a downside. I recall now the delightful movie The Four
Seasons where three couples always go somewhere together. In one scene they're sailing in gorgeous turquoise waters on a rented schooner where all manner of trouble occurs. One of the men has just married someone half his age and they are rocking the boat, shall we say. Another guy, a dentist, keeps meticulous track of who owes what and the third, played by Alan Alda, over analyzes everything. In a later scene the group is staying in a cabin near a ski resort. Two of the men are shortly in plaster casts up to the knee and the third drives his Mercedes onto a lake he believes is completely frozen but is not.
I wonder now if a staycation is the ticket. It is cheap and predictable, you can brush your teeth all by yourself, and you can sit around in your pajamas all day long. You can read a steamy novel, watch a B movie, and have KFC for breakfast and nobody will ever know. This would be called privacy, and it is a precious commodity in a world where there is little of it left.
Best regards,
Elisabeth
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