How I spent my summer vacation

There have been numerous requests, nay demands, that I provide a follow-up post to my last AGMA “I’m going to the beach” post.

The postmortem, as I call it.

To those of you who really couldn’t give a rat’s ass, stop now and tune into another fun, isn’t-a-world-with-Donald-Trump-in-it-strange post next week.  To those of you who asked, be careful what you wish for.  Here goes…

Overall, I will say that it was no worse than I expected.  This is actually kind of a sort of a lie because I believe in miracles.  I always hold out this Pollyanna hope somewhere in my cold, frozen heart that everybody in my family will realize how precious everybody else in our family is and change their cranky ways.  But it didn’t happen.

*sigh*

Did I mention that I had a 20 mile training run the morning I left?  Yup.  After the run, I had to hurry home, shower, finish packing and get all the baby crap together, get the house semi-together and get everything down to the garage to wait for my son to pick me up.  I live in a four story townhouse.  It’s two flights of stairs from our garage up to the master BR.  You can guess how I felt when finally I crawled into my son’s car after two hours of running up and down the stairs.

Ouch.

It’s a five hour drive to the beach.  For probably two hours, we listened to DeadMau5. Okay, maybe it was only for thirty minutes but it seemed like two hours.  It actually seemed like a lifetime.  If you aren’t familiar with DM5’s incredibly rich musical sounds (I’m literally choking as I write this…) check it out here.  It felt like somebody was driving hot rivets into my head.

My apologies to you DeadMau5 fans out there of which I’m sure AGMA has many…

My husband had left Atlanta early to pick up my son, DIL and the cutest grandson in the world from the airport near the beach.  I received the message that all went well with the pick-up.  1st hurdle successfully navigated.

1 down, 340 left.

My younger son and I arrived at the beach around 6 PM.  I was hungry, exhaused from my 2:30 AM wake-up and 20 mile run, with my head split open from the Mau5Man music.  And everybody was waiting for me to go shopping and cook dinner.  I went to the grocery store and bought a frozen pizza.

The 2nd hurdle didn’t go so well.  I got the stink eye.

Only 339 hurdles left.

Now that I think back on it, without going into detail, it’s amazing how there can be so much drama over nothing in only a three days.  And, sadly, as expected, the drama all originated from my son and DIL.  In all fairness, my DIL was sick.  But then it seems as if my DIL is always sick when we’re around.  Cause and effect perhaps?

Hmmmm…

My grandson didn’t sleep well at all the first night.  And he was up bright and early the next morning.  Both my son and DIL were dog tired for a good part of the trip.  But it didn’t help that they drank so much at night and stayed up late.  Duh.

I know nothing; I see nothing.

On the positive side, the rest of my family was great!  My younger son was fun and good company.  My nieces and their husbands were wonderful, and it was great to see and hang out with their kids.  My brother and I only had very superficial conversations so it was pleasant.  He was on his good behavior.  My SIL was as expected.  I asked her all of the “how have you been, what have you been doing, how’s your sister?” questions and she asked zero about my husband or myself.  But it worked for me.  She didn’t give me the stink eye once.  That I saw.

My sister was also on her good behavior too.  She drank, but evidently not so much that she got fall down drunk.  We usually left the “party” fairly early in the evening when she was still drinking, but it appears as if she maintained control.  Relief doesn’t even begin to describe the feeling.

And my family loved, loved, loved my grandson.  But seriously, what’s not to love? He’s cute and smiley and chubby and, gosh darn it, just all around adorable.  But I’m not biased…

All he had to do was smile at me when I walked into whatever room he was in and blinding sunshine instantly cut through the clouds generated by my son and DIL.  My heart melted and I was a babbling pool of mush for the next 15 minutes.

And for those of you wondering, I did drink.  The first night.  I had to because of the frozen pizza dinner fiasco and the stink eye.  I had a pomegranate vodka martini and two beers.  Guess I must have still been dehydrated from my 20 mile run – I had sweated like Jackie Gleason trying to keep up with the June Taylor Dancers. (That’s a reference only those of a certain age will “get”.)  I had a pounding headache in the morning and was not on top of the the AGMA game.  That was a tough day.

I didn’t drink again for the next two days.  My Australian nephew-in-law thought I was crazy that I opted out of adult beverages.  Gotta love the Aussies!

My husband and I spent two nights in Charleston, SC after my kids left and we checked out of the condo.  I’m sad to say that I only started to relax and felt like I could be myself when we checked into our hotel.  I didn’t realize how tense I was until I wasn’t tense anymore.  Does that make sense?

So would I do it again?  Probably.  If I weigh the pro’s and con’s, it was worth all of the hard work and money spent and headaches (literally!) and heartaches to spend time with my wonderful grandson, my younger son and my nieces and their families. Plus, as much as they are ambivalent about my family and myself, it was good to see my brother and SIL after 2 years.

I know – there is something seriously wrong with me.

But, for the love of God, please, please don’t make me listen to DeadMau5 again!  I’m pretty sure I couldn’t survive a second encounter.

Thump, thump, thump…