Need A Break!

Focusing on the positive again!  Vacation is only a few hours away, just waiting on J to get back from a Saturday morning meeting at work.  We’ve not had a true vacation since our California trip last October.  This trip, we are going to a very small coastal island in Florida, where there is nothing to do, and where we’ll take a car ferry just to get there.  No driving, no interstate, no traffic.  Just walking the beach, strolling the quaint downtown when it’s dinner time.  It will still be somewhat chilly this time of year, and I’m hoping that means not many other vacationers will be around.  J and I are not much for crowds.

J and I decided we are not going to take any “big” vacations this year, to try and save money but also to try and relax more.  Our normal vacation schedule every year is one week in Florida, one 7 day cruise where we always get a big cabin, and then one huge blowout vacation week, normally California or Vegas.  This year, we’re not going any place where we have to fly, where we will be staying at a casino, where we will leave the country.  This year it’s going to be all about slow getaways, relaxing, unwinding, peace and rest, being alone but together.  Usually on our vacations, we try to cram in as much activity and sightseeing as possible, and we come back utterly exhausted and in the hole a few grand.  We drive from here to there all day long, every day.  Or we buy too much/eat too much/spend too much in Mexico or Atlantic City or Los Angeles.   I am happy we are going to downsize our vacations this year.  I think this will work out for us well, and it’s just what we need.  Mostly, I hope J will be able to relax for the week, instead of getting even more stressed out trying to keep up with a self-inflicted non-stop vacation itinerary.

I told J, I’m hoping that we’ll find we don’t need to take the big glitzy trips every time our vacations roll around.  I am hoping that we’ll discover that having nowhere to go in the morning besides getting coffee and taking it down to the shoreline, is just the right pace.  Our hotel is just two blocks from the beach, that’s the most hustling and bustling I want to do on this trip.

No matter where we go, J has to work, dragging his laptop along.  I wish I could save him from it, but that’s out of my control.  He says he prefers to work while we are gone in order to keep up, instead of coming back to a thousand emails to catch up on.  I understand the concept, but secretly I resent it.  Not J, because I know he’s doing the right thing.  Just resenting the situation, the phone calls, the urgent texts, the issues that no one else can take care of but J, and how it cuts into my time with him, our time together that is supposed to be a vacation from work.  Then I remind myself that work is paying for the vacation. 

On the other hand, work is WHY we need the vacation, what we are trying to get away from in the first place.  Vicious cycle.  But this time it leads to blue ocean views, clear skies, and sun on my shoulders.

MISS GEE