Almost a year ago, my husband and I paid for this year's vacation. It's a standing vacation that has occurred annually for over 25 years now. We go to a secluded place in Canada with the entire family (in-laws, outlaws, children, babies, dogs), and torture ourselves for several days by being surrounded with too many people, in too close quarters, with way too many mosquitoes. I am the door police, by the way, always on high alert for open doors where mosquitoes and flies can enter. "Close that door! Stop standing there with the door open! Are you working for the enemy? Do you like sleeping in bug spray? Do you like something buzzing in your ear all night? Do you enjoy having a fly's saliva on your food? What is wrong with you? Are you a masochist? A sadist? Close that door before I come over there and lock you out. In the dark. With the mosquitoes. I will relish it. Why? Because you don't listen. Ever." Well, you get the idea.
And then there is the agony they love to put me through when I finally relent and get into the water, get on that Godforsaken tube, and hold on for dear life, so that they can pull me around the lake, whooping and hollering like a band of cowboys who have just caught and roped the biggest cow ever. Try as they may to knock me off that thing, I do not let go. I don't care if every nail is broken off of each finger, or if my teeth get knocked out from the violent throbs of that mammoth piece of plastic hitting me in the face as they loop around and go back through waves. All for the sheer pleasure of seeing me fall off, screaming for help as they circle like a swarm of vultures ready to swoop in on some bloated carrion. Why I give in to this every year is beyond me except that I must get some sort of sick pleasure out of seeing people so entertained by my own screams of fear and misery. My tormenters are still talking about what happened last year when I slipped off the tube into water where there was a bunch of this long grassy stuff that kept touching/grabbing my legs. I'll spare you the details of that for some other time, mostly because I don't want to recount right now. It's too traumatizing and I won't be seeing my therapist for two weeks.
A few years ago, the family decided to have what my mother-in-law refers to as "Hell Week" at a cottage in New York where she and my father-in-law actually reside year round. Here is a picture of my brother-in-law and I after a day on the boat, back inside, cocktails in hand, harassing Shirley.
Without starting another family uproar, suffice it to say that that was the first and last "Hell Week" held at the home of Dad and Shirley. A few years later, almost one divorce, and a few medication adjustments, the family packs it all up and goes north to Canada to wreak havoc on a country other than our own. Shirley stays home.
So here it is, another year, and I am trying to get out of Dodge to be with a pack of lunatics for 7 days. It hasn't been easy this time, however, trying to work around Catherine's schedule and make sure she has rides to wherever she and Liam need to go. Catherine and our son, Chip, aren't joining us this year because of their own schedules, i.e., work, baby doctor appointments, etc. I did, however, ask Chip if he would carefully use one of our cars while we are gone and take his sister and her son wherever they needed to go. He was happy to help us out until he checked with the Secretary of State to be sure that his last ticket had been lifted from his license. Unfortunately, and because the State of Michigan does not look lightly upon those who think they are, and can, drive like Nascar drivers when they aren't, and can't, his license is suspended until he appears in Court next month and they get an opportunity to ask him what he has to say for himself.
So my husband is leaving tonight while I stay behind until Tuesday, when we hopefully have all of the rides lined up for the week and I can leave here with a clear conscience, a light heart and a happy demeanor. For now, I am lecturing both of my children on the woes of false aspirations and understanding that the chances of them becoming Nascar drivers are just as slim as the chances of me becoming the next American Idol.
Copyright 2008 liamsgrandma
