These days, not so much. And while I can already hear your mind ticking...
Clearly it has nothing to do with my age. It has to be something else. Global warming. Santa Ana winds. El Nino. His little sister, La Nina. Normally, I would blame being tossed around like a rag doll on the latest Tropical Storm - as they generally seem to plant themselves off the coast the same week we are vacationing. But this time, we lucked out - the storm was still way far away.
Maybe it was the raft. Probably. Raft error. That sounds good. I mean, I think I used to be able to actually sit on a raft in the ocean and just right the swells while chatting it up with my pals. This go I spent a good twenty minutes trying to launch myself onto the raft without success. Unless you rate success as falling off the other side, tipping backwards, getting stuck under the raft, nearly losing a piece of your suit or drinking several gallons of ocean water.
Obviously the ocean is changing.
Never mind that after a quick half hour of flailing about I developed a great urge to lay down on my beach blanket and read. This actually frightened me a bit as I specifically remember thinking (again...decades ago) how lame 'those' people were. The ones who dragged all their stuff out on the beach and then just slumbered on their blankets reading. Have I become one of those people. Um. Yeah. Actually.
Of course in order to reach that goal I had to work my way back in from the deeps. Proof again of a changing ocean. I'm sure it was just last year that I would trollop to the shallows, practically skipping and dancing over the incoming waves. There was no skipping this year. For some reason my legs got shorter making it impossible to trollop anywhere. It was more of a lean forward and push kind of action that seemed to gain me only about three inches at a stride.
I made it eventually.
I've also become, evidently, a beach walker. Again - one of those people I used to mock. Why would one drag all their stuff out to the perfect spot (cooler, towels, rafts, blanket, book, snacks, lotion, hat, sunglasses, tshirt) only to lay it all out with a nod and then head out for a long walk? Why? I have no idea. But I actually enjoyed it.
Since we were at the beach as a group - my brother, nephew, niece and pseudo-nephew - we would take turns being the go-getters. Jamie and I would head out on our walk first leaving the boys in charge of our stuff. I have no doubt that was all talk - I have no doubt they paid zero attention to our stuff because they were busy trying to pick up chicks. When we returned, the boys would head out for their walk. Which was actually a run - because if your young and single at the beach you've got to show off what you can.
Jamie and I had some fantastic talks on our walks. I think that's why I enjoyed them so much. So much that I didn't realize my back was turning lobster red or my calves were begging for mercy. Sand walking is a tough sport.
This was our routine for most of the week - up for breakfast, off to the beach, home for a late lunch, activity, dinner and cocktails. The activities included riding the giant Ferris wheel in Myrtle, Broadway at the Beach, shopping and the annual World Championship of Mini-Golf. Which I still didn't win. Apparently in order to win that you have to have a wiener.
We did do a charter trip to go deep sea fishing. Remember Matt? My pseudo-nephew who caught half the sea on last year's fishing trip? I'm happy to say his take this year was zero. I feel bad. I really do. Remember how I only catch things that can't be kept? Yep. Blue fish. Too small. However...lest we come home empty handed....there was this:
Of COURSE I didn't catch that. But you know why? It's because I'm so nice. Because when you are on a good charter, they make you pick a reeling order - that way everybody knows who is reeling in the next 'big' one. There's none of that panic "I don't want to do it!" stuff.
And because I'm so kind, I let my brother have the first go. Had I known this would be our only 'big' catch, surely I could have thought differently. Or not. It looked kind of hard.
Mid week - we got an update from my sister, showing her latest tattoo...a picture of a dog paw on the top of her foot with the names of her two dogs above and below it. Which got my mom thinking. That maybe she'd like a tattoo of her animals' names. And just how far up her leg that would go. Is it weird that we spent the morning giving my mom a tattoo with a dry erase marker? Is it weird that she walked around all day with this on her leg?
What'd you do on your summer vacation? Get beaten by a bunch of waves? Turn your back into the shade of a ripe tomato? Tattoo your mom? Chase around a new kitten? Give your dad a titty-twister just before this picture was snapped? If you said no to any of these...then you didn't have as much fun as we did. So sorry.
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