Day One: Unwind

August 8, 2016

Paul and I have both been working long hours the past few months.  Fifty and sixty hour weeks are taxing after awhile.  So we’ve been anticipating our summer vacation in a big way.  And today’s the day.

Several years ago we were privileged to be invited along with friends on their annual family bus trip to the Canadian Rockies.  We must not have been too obnoxious because they invited us again, this time to Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island.  Such was our state of eagerness to be away from all our daily stresses that we arrived at the bus almost an hour and a half early.  I had told Paul I’d be ready by 7:30 so we could make the ten-minute drive to the bus from our house in plenty of time for our 9:00 AM departure.  At 7:26 he was sitting in the vehicle with the motor running.  “Why are you rushing me?!” I asked him, a mite testy. 

“I’m not rushing you.”  He sounded amazed that I would feel rushed simply because he was burning fuel in the driveway.  I made a mental note to tell him I‘d be ready a half hour later than I actually intended to be the next time we planned a vacation.  When we pulled into the tour company’s office no one was there and everything was still locked up securely. 

Paul walked over to talk to the carpenters working on an office remodel. To kill time I zipped over to nearby Mrs. Yoder’s Restaurant in Mt. Hope and bought a home-made, still warm, cinnamon roll to go.  After weeks of running at high speed from the wee hours until falling into bed at night, all on a steady diet of donuts and coffee, I find that one cannot simply turn off the adrenaline nor the sugar cravings at will.  Baby steps.  I’ll try to eat better the rest of the day.  But first, breakfast.

The weather was beautiful.  Not too hot.  Not too cold.  Seeing friends we’d made two years ago board the bus again this morning brought back a host of good memories.  The bus was winding its way through the Holmes County hills while I finished up some work-related lose ends on my phone before I settled in for my morning nap.  Bliss, I tell you.  My neck muscles started to feel almost relaxed.

In due course we reached the 80/90 turnpike and Junior pulled to the side of the road to put the EZ Pass ID on the dashboard, which reminded me of a story someone told me several years ago when I was on a trip to Iowa.

It seems one of my traveling companions, Marilyn, was with a friend on a prior vacation, a young lady unfamiliar with the convenience and requirements of EZ Pass.  Mistakenly entering the wrong lane they found themselves handing money to an unoccupied booth in the EZ Pass lane. “You can’t stop here!” Marilyn emphatically informed her friend who was behind the wheel. “There’s a big rig bearing down on us and they don’t stop for these!  We have to go! Now!”

Not knowing what to do the panic-stricken driver hurled her money through the open window and sped out of the way of the rapidly approaching truck.  It must have worked since she never received any notice from the highway department informing her of the error of her ways.  Or maybe whoever reviews the videos searching for thieving motorists is still laughing. 

We ate lunch at a Chick-Filet, outside, a warm breeze further loosening up my neck muscles.  I walked to the McDonalds next door for a coffee to go and got one for Paul too.  They must have thought I qualified for the senior discount or else they have really cheap coffee.  Whatever, it was good. I had resisted the fries and bread for lunch, sticking with chicken strips and a chocolate shake.  I’ve heard that chocolate is good for you.  And then it was back on the bus and time for my afternoon nap. 

We ate dinner at a nondescript local dive called Danny’s. Nondescript on the outside, anyway.  Inside, the smells of made-with-real-food cuisine welcomed us in. What to order was a dilemma but I handled it with the experience of many years to back me up.  Autumn Chicken Pasta won the day.  It was a garlic-infused chicken, bacon, sun-dried tomato, asparagus, farfalle pasta wonder.  Never mind that I was a veritable cloud of garlic the rest of the evening.  My palate was pleased.

Back at the hotel a hot game of Hand and Foot commenced.  Yes, my team lost.  But even that did not affect my neck muscles negatively.  And there’s always a rematch to look forward to.