gone fishin'

the owner is away for a week with his sons, roughing it at some holy-but-not unitarian church camp. they went last year and he enjoyed it enough for a repeat visit. no shirt, no shoes kinda thing and sleeping in a tent.

a friend is prepping for his annual vacation, this year to paris after spending the last two in london. he goes alone and spends about a week doing whatever he damn well pleases, which is mostly haunting museums and pubs. a scant few weeks after he comes home, he'll be going to malibu for 5 days for a friend's wedding.

this morning i realized it has been over a decade sine i took a real vacation. the owner took me away last summer, an excuse to jet around in his then-new convertible. it was mad-fun, but only a few days. the final day we drove the entire way from halifax to home, in and out of rain, and it was an exhausting end to a whirlwind of lobster eating and fucking.

i've taken a few vino boondoggles to napa and oregon, but those too were only 4 days or so, and getting to and from the willamette valley is a biyatch.

my financial situation since i moved here has been consistently precarious, and the resources haven't been available to be hopping anything besides the subway, so a very real reason for staying home.

BUT...

today i got called off work being too perilously close to the overtime bugaboo. everybody i like is elsewhere so i had free time and suddenly nowhere i needed to be and nothing i had to do. a lovely day and i was showered and prepared to face the public. after the phone call, i had some lunch. i read some. i sat on my deck watching brown men play soccer and white ones play softball. little kids were flying kites and dogs were scampering.

i drank iced tea.

i read some more.

now it's dark and i realize i basically did nothing all day and it was fine.

memories of past trips floated through my mind and i ached recalling how much i love to travel. i am no fan of 14 cities in 10 days kinds of trips. i like to share drinks with the locals, eat their food and stroll their streets. wake up early, then plan my day, or not, not to travel with a jammed agenda. to lose track of what day it is and not care what time it is.

my last vacation like that was to london and paris for 10 days. as beautiful as london is, its chilly citizens and damp climate simply don't sing to me like those where the romance languages are spoken. i prowled museums, had amazing dinners at nobu and vong, the best mackerel of my life in a tiny bistro, and walked and walked and walked. although i was with my fiancee, my memory of the trip is that i spent much of my time alone because he was too drunk and/or passed out to be conversant or mobile. when he was awares, he made me cry a lot. that part sucked. hard. however, it made me know i'd be perfectly fine traveling on my own when means permit. as an only child i suppose that's not surprising, but i felt very peaceful having a glass of wine at a sidewalk cafe and watching just everything, with no particular place to be and nobody making me be... anything, except a woman on vacation.

there is nothing like that decompression, immersion and anonymity of away from home and, more importantly, work.

my money puzzle has one piece yet to be fitted. it drives me often to distraction and sometimes to drink. i am on the wrong end of a rube goldberg contraption waiting for the shoe of unknown size to drop. once it falls, and the stress narrative that is a constant loop in my head can be shut the hell off, i will allow myself thoughts of going someplace. away. on vacation. i deserve it. don't i?