Florida

Try Again

/ Ann Coleman / 90 Comments

IMG_1442 2My husband and I try to take a Florida vacation every January.  We’re not fans of the month’s cold days and long nights, so it makes sense for us to spend a week of it on a warm Florida beach.  We also like having something fun to look forward to after the holidays wind down, and have found that nothing beats the post-Christmas blahs quite like throwing shorts, swimsuits and sun screen in a suitcase and heading south for a few days of rest and relaxation.

But this year was different.  I had a hard time looking forward to this trip, and it wasn’t just because the pandemic has taught me to have a “wait and see” attitude about almost everything I schedule. The problem was that this year’s vacation was going to be almost an exact repeat of the trip we took last January:  we were leaving on Martin Luther King weekend, going to the same coastal island, and rented the exact same condo.  And sadly, last year’s trip didn’t go so well.

Last year’s trip was supposed to be a celebration of my husband’s successful battle with cancer.  I was planning to reserve a table on the patio of one of the area’s nicer restaurants, and was even going to order a bottle of champagne for a special toast.  But things went wrong from the start.

While we were driving down the highway a rock flew up and cracked the windshield of our rental car.  Later that day, a distracted bicyclist rode smack into our car.  It wasn’t our fault and she wasn’t seriously injured, but it was very upsetting even so. Then I began having eye symptoms that might mean an injured retina, which I knew could mean a surgery with a long recovery.  But worst of all was the call from my husband’s surgeon with the results of the biopsy from his recent scope.  The surgeon said it was nothing to worry about, but after looking it up online, we were convinced he had grown a new tumor.  So much for our week of relaxation and celebration….

So I suppose in the back of my mind, I secretly believed that bad things were going to happen on this trip.  I’m not superstitious, but I had learned to associate this particular area with serious problems, and that made it hard for me to truly believe that we were going to have fun this time.

But we did.  We had no problems with the car, no accidents, and absolutely no bad news from any of my husband’s doctors.  We walked the beach, did a puzzle, slept late, ate out on patios, and in general had the sort of week that I had envisioned last year.  I didn’t order a bottle of champagne, but we did finally toast the fact that my husband’s cancer is gone.

Before our trip, I had toyed with the idea of cancelling our reservations and going somewhere else this year, somewhere with no bad memories.  I’m so glad I didn’t cancel and let those bad memories ruin a lovely vacation spot for us.  Because sometimes, the best thing to do is to give places (and people) a chance to redeem themselves…….

All Together Now

/ Ann Coleman / 84 Comments

If the past couple of years have taught me anything, it’s the importance of being flexible.  So even though I’d been very much looking forward to a Florida getaway with my family, I kept telling myself that there was always a possibility that the trip wouldn’t actually happen.  I told myself this even as I arranged for our house/dog sitter, packed my bags, arrived at at the airport and all the way up to the moment when our plane actually took off.  It was only once we were safely in the air that I finally drew a sigh of relief and allowed myself to believe that this much-anticipated vacation was truly beginning.

It’s not that there was anything particularly special about our trip.  We weren’t heading to an exotic destination, or checking something big off our “bucket list” or even treating ourselves to something new and different.  We were just renting a vacation home for a week and our only plan was to relax and spend time with our family.  I know it may sound boring to some people, but at this point in my life, it struck me as the perfect vacation plan and I was more than ready for it.

3859E432-F548-4257-89B5-54F1E547F1AB_1_201_aAnd things went mostly according to plan.  As we settled into our house, I soon realized that relaxation is a rare commodity when you’re vacationing with a three-year old and a one-year old.  (I’d count myself lucky if I could muster up just one-tenth of their energy and stamina.)  But that was just fine, because I also realized that although sharing a house with active little people may not be relaxing, it sure is fun and entertaining, especially if they happen to be your grandchildren.  There’s something pretty special about stumbling out of bed in the morning and being greeted with big smiles, hugs, and an enthusiastic, “Yea!  Grandma’s up!” I mean, my husband and I love each other dearly, but mostly we just grunt at each other first thing in the morning.

Sharing a house with our kids and their families for the week also gave us a chance to reconnect in ways that just don’t happen in our normal, day-to-day life.  Late night conversations around the hot tub when the little ones were safely tucked in bed, working on a jigsaw puzzle together, or even just sharing a meal as a family were gifts to be savored.  Even sitting back and watching others interact was special, because I knew those interactions were strengthening family bonds that should last long after my husband and I are gone. 

Now it’s over, and I’m slowly adjusting back to a life that is both more solitary and hectic than the one I enjoyed while on vacation.  I’m actually a bit more tired than before I went, but that’s normal because travel is wearing and so is catching up on all the chores that waited patiently for my return.  The weariness will pass but the memories of our time together aren’t going anywhere, and wouldn’t trade those for anything in the world…..

Recharged

/ Ann Coleman / 93 Comments

Sometimes we all just need to take a little break, and I have to admit that I was more than ready for mine.  My husband and I had planned a trip to Florida for early May before we knew that he would be having major surgery this past Spring.  For a little while we both believed that the trip would have to be cancelled, so you can imagine our relief when the surgeon gave his permission to go, pointing out that my husband could recover at a beachfront condo just as well as he could at home.

But when my husband’s hospital stay extended a week longer than it should have, we still thought that our much-anticipated vacation wasn’t going to happen.  I told myself that it didn’t matter, and that as soon as my husband was better we’d go on a trip somewhere fun, but deep down I was very disappointed.  It’s been a very tough year for my family, and I really wanted to spend a week relaxing at on my beloved Sanibel Island.  I actually felt foolish for looking forward to this trip so much, because the past few months had me almost conditioned to be afraid to look forward to much of anything at all.

I know adversity can make us stronger and more focused on what’s important in our lives, and that’s a very good thing. But sometimes, it can also train us to believe that not only is “the glass half empty,” but that it’s bone dry and will remain that way forever.  When disappointments and bad news come at us too quickly, or when difficult circumstances last for too long, it can become very hard to hang on to our optimistic attitudes and to allow ourselves to really believe that things will ever improve.  Or at least that’s been my experience.

But you know what?  Despite the need for a major surgery we thought he had avoided, and despite the complications that kept my husband in the hospital much longer than we had anticipated, we were able to go on our trip.  My daughter and her family joined us, and we had a wonderful family time just hanging out together, walking the beach, swimming, and (in my husband’s case) taking LOTS of much-needed naps.

I can honestly say that my husband made great strides in his recovery during our trip, which was a real blessing.  But he wasn’t the only one who benefited from our week away from it all.  With each passing day, I felt my spirits lifting just a little bit more.  My heart began to feel lighter, and I felt calmer and more at peace than I had in a long, long time.  The experience was healing for both of us, just in different ways.

ZWZqbuKtTFOCLFbCPIs2oAI know that I was very lucky to be able to go on vacation recently, and that many people are still living under restrictions that don’t allow any travel at all.  But my point is that all of us, no matter what our circumstances, would benefit from finding a way to take a break from our problems and spending even a little time doing whatever we can to recharge our bodies and refresh our souls.  Keeping hope alive and finding those moments of happiness isn’t always easy, but it is always worth the effort.

Just Before Dawn

/ Ann Coleman / 87 Comments

IMG_0830My husband and I had really been looking forward to our vacation.   Last Fall had been particularly busy and stressful, followed by a hectic Holiday schedule.  By mid-January, we were both more than ready for a week of relaxation in the Florida sun and counting down the days until our departure.

But then we noticed that snow and ice were predicted on the morning that we were scheduled to leave.  Unwilling to risk losing even one day of our precious vacation, we decided to leave a day early, even though we’d have to fly into Ft. Lauderdale, spend the night there and then drive across the state to Ft. Myers the next morning.  We booked a hotel that was supposed to be right by the airport, rented a car, and figured we were all set.

It wasn’t until we were leaving the Ft. Lauderdale airport that we  realized we’d left all of our hotel booking information at home.  All we could remember was the name of the hotel, so we asked for directions as we were leaving the rental car lot.  I’ll never know if the attendant didn’t hear us correctly or if she just had a sadistic streak, but the directions she gave took us no where near our hotel.  If you’ve ever been lost in a strange city at night, you’ll have some idea of the mood in our car as we searched in vain for a Courtyard Hotel near the airport.  It wasn’t our finest hour, relationship-wise.   I’ll spare you the details of who said what, but suffice it to say that we arrived at our hotel almost two hours later, tired, hungry and in desperate need of a drink (or two)….only to discover that the hotel’s bar/restaurant had already closed for the night.

We awoke the next morning to a beautiful sunny day, so we were in good spirits as we drove across Florida to the Ft. Myers area.  The room in our new hotel was spacious and clean and everything was going quite well until that evening, when it was time to head to a nearby restaurant to meet friends for dinner.  That’s when we realized that the deadbolt on our door had broken and we were locked in our hotel room.

First we panicked, then we called the front desk and asked for help.  The assistant manager came quickly, but he couldn’t get the door to open either.  The good news was that there was a door to an adjoining room, so he was able to go into that room and then unlock the connecting door and enter our room.  The bad news was that the connecting door slammed shut behind him and automatically locked, so then all three of us were locked in our hotel room.

We repeated our panicking/call the front desk routine, and they sent someone down to unlock the connecting door. We couldn’t get out of there fast enough, and all through dinner I kept wondering what we were going to do if they couldn’t find a locksmith to fix our door because I knew the hotel was full.  At that point I was beginning to wonder if the Florida vacation we had dreamed of was ever going to materialize.

But from then on, our vacation was basically everything we had hoped it would be:  a time to relax and unwind, walk along a sandy beach and just “recharge our batteries.”  I guess I forgot that sometimes we have to wait awhile for the things we want, and sometimes we have to overcome a few obstacles before we get where we want to be.  That’s just the way life is, and it’s something that I need to remember when I’m struggling through some hard times:  that the darkest hour really is just before dawn.  And all we have to do is hang in there….

Real Time

/ Ann Coleman / 72 Comments

Sometimes it’s hard to really stay in touch with the people we love, even if we see them on a regular basis.  I know my husband and I are very fortunate to have our adult son and daughter (along with their spouses and our grandson) living in the same town as we do, close enough that we can easily visit each other’s homes.  But we all lead very busy lives, and so it can still be difficult to find the time to gather everyone together for a family meal, or even to have the kind of real conversations that allow us to keep up with each other’s true thoughts and feelings.

Like so many people, we often rely on the the convenience of text messaging to communicate with each other.  And while texts certainly have the advantage of being quick and easy, they aren’t at all the same thing as a face-to-face conversation.  Texts don’t allow us to hear someone’s tone of voice, or to read their expression and body language.  The truth is that we all need the chance to spend “quality time” now and then with the people who are most important to us.

Which is why I was so very grateful for the chance to spend a week in Florida recently, sharing a house with all seven members of my immediate family.  Living together for a week without the usual distractions and demands on our time gave us the opportunity to relax and enjoy each other’s company in exactly the way I had hoped.

u4gYQgJ8TEei69SASvgWe shared meals together, played games, swam in the pool, worked a puzzle, watched some beautiful sunsets, laughed, and just talked about whatever happened to be on our minds.  Living with my grandson for a week reminded me of just how much work, and just how much fun, caring for a toddler can be.  It was great to witness my daughter and son-in-law’s impressive parenting skills, and to watch my grandson grow even closer to my son and daughter-in-law.

There’s no such thing as a perfect vacation, and this one was no exception.  The temperatures and humidity were both too high to really enjoy being outside early in the week, and the house wasn’t as close to the beach as we had hoped.  I’ll also spare you the details of where we found the giant dead roach. (You’re welcome.)

fullsizeoutput_5564But those were just minor glitches that didn’t matter at all.  We still had a wonderful week together.  Our recent vacation gave us the perfect chance to grow just a little bit closer as a family, and to truly strengthen the bonds that hold us all together.  And in that sense, it was all I possibly could have asked for, and more.

Family Vacation

/ Ann Coleman / 72 Comments

I still remember the first time my husband and I took a beach vacation together.  I was pregnant with my daughter, and we wanted to go on a final trip as a couple before we started our family.   We flew to Sanibel Island in Florida, where we rented a beachfront condo and spent the week relaxing in the sun and basically falling in love with Sanibel.  In the years to come, we returned to Florida as often as we could, bringing our children with us.  I honestly think that one of the reasons we like Florida so much is simply because we have so many happy memories of our family vacations there.

IMG_0022Last week, my husband and I spent yet another week in Florida, sharing a vacation home on Marco Island with my daughter, son-in-law and our baby grandson.  We walked the nearby beach, swam in the pool and even went on a sight-seeing cruise.  It was our first  family vacation that included our grandson, which made it even more fun and special.  Especially when I walked the beach with him and thought of all the time that had passed since I had walked a Florida beach when I was pregnant with his mother.

Sometimes I have a hard time believing that I am actually a grandmother now.  It doesn’t seem so very long ago when I was a young mother myself, and when a family vacation entailed a whole lot of planning and preparation.  I remember making “busy bags” to keep the kids occupied on the long car rides and spending so much time making sure their suitcases were properly packed that I usually forgot stuff I wanted to put in my own suitcase.   And what I forgot was usually something that I really needed, like a swimsuit.  Or underwear.  Vacations back then were fun, but they were also a lot of work.

And yet here I am, a sixty-year old grandmother whose own two “kids” are all grown up now, one of them with a baby of her own.  And I’m gradually getting used to this new season of my life, and realizing that it brings its own gifts.  It truly was a joy to have our grandson along on this trip, and to be in the position of simply helping as his parents took good care of him.

IMG_4094If I’m lucky, I’ll be able to enjoy more vacations with my children and their families, and I look forward to that possibility.  But even if that doesn’t happen, even if this is our last family trip to Florida, I’ll be content.  Because I already have enough good memories to last a lifetime.

The Perfect Vacation

/ Ann Coleman / 104 Comments

My husband and I just returned from a fun week spent vacationing with some good friends.  We rented a home in Florida that was within walking distance to the beach.  The weather was warm and mostly sunny, and we had great time just relaxing and exploring the area with our friends.  It was the sort of vacation that my husband and I will be talking about for a long time, and I’m sure my friends will be talking about it as well.   But the thing is, I strongly suspect that we won’t be saying exactly the same things.

IMG_2990My husband and I will talking about how nice it was to walk to the beach, how much we enjoyed getting a break from what has been an extremely cold winter and how much more relaxed we feel after a week away from everything.  I’m sure our friends would agree with all that, but I still think their conversation about the past week would go something more like this:

Him:  “Did you notice that they vacuumed the floors four times?”

Her:  “They also did a load of laundry every single day.  Who vacuums and does laundry on vacation?”

Him:  “Apparently, they do.  The way they kept the kitchen so spotless should have warned us.  I barely finished my coffee before they whisked the cup away and stuck it in the dishwasher.”

And the thing is, all of it would be true.  I remember pulling into the driveway of a vacation house one year and seeing my husband up on a ladder, washing the living room windows.  When I asked him about it, he said he didn’t want to spend his vacation looking out dirty windows.  Later that week, we were sitting in a beach bar chatting with some of the locals, and I mentioned the window cleaning story.  After a brief and stunned silence, several of them offered us their business cards, telling us that they had wonderful vacation properties that they were quite sure we would love to rent.

The simple fact of the matter is that my husband are the ideal renters.  When we check out of any kind of vacation rental, the condo or house is usually much cleaner than it was when we checked in.  And if something was broken when we checked in, you can bet that it’s been fixed when we check out.  Sometimes I think that the property owners should be paying us to stay in their properties, but unfortunately, it doesn’t work that way.  We’ve never even been offered a discount.  The world is still an unfair place in so many ways.

I know our habit of cleaning and tidying while on vacation is, to say the least, unusual.  (I’ve even been known to vacuum hotel rooms when I can talk the staff into lending me one.)  But vacationing is all about doing what makes us happy, and my husband and I are happiest when we are staying somewhere clean and tidy, even if that means we have to do a bit of that cleaning ourselves.  And if we happen to be vacationing with friends or family, it also gives them a vacation experience that they’ll be talking about for quite some time.

Because You’ve Got To Take A Chance

/ Ann Coleman / 2 Comments

IMG_3571Thirty years ago, my husband and I were deciding where to go for our annual vacation.  I was almost six months pregnant, so I was looking into places that would be within easy driving distance.  Then a friend mentioned that she had just returned from Sanibel Island in Florida, and said it was really very nice.  She said there were great beaches, beautiful bike paths and lots of unspoiled scenery.

That sounded great, but I wasn’t sold.  We’d have to fly, and I didn’t know how much that would cost or if my doctor would even allow it.  I had no idea where to stay on the island, didn’t own a maternity swimsuit, and weren’t there a lot of alligators in Florida?  I thought Lexington, Kentucky sounded like a safer bet.  But it did seem sort of silly to choose Kentucky over a beautiful barrier island, and after careful thought and with my doctor’s permission, we booked a condo on Sanibel Island and hoped for the best.

Our flight got in late, and we drove for a long time on a dark, unmarked highway, fairly sure we were lost as we tried to find the causeway to the island. We finally made it and located our condo, only to discover that they had put us in a two bedroom condo which was way more than we had budgeted for, but there was no manager on duty at that hour to switch us.  By that point, we were frustrated, exhausted, and quite sure we had made a terrible mistake by coming.  All we could do was go to bed and hope things would get better in the morning.

Luckily, they did. The morning light revealed that my friend had not exaggerated when she told us how beautiful the island was, and a friendly manager moved us to a nice one bedroom unit with a view of the ocean.  We had a great time, even if I did have to walk the beach wearing a swimsuit that looked like a tent.  Sanibel  is now our favorite vacation spot, and we have been back there too many times to count.  But we never would have discovered it if we hadn’t taken a chance and stepped out of our comfort zone all those years ago.

I need to remember that now, as I tend to want to stick with the comfortable and familiar with my middle-aged self.   But the truth is that almost every good thing in my life is a direct result of going out of my comfort zone and taking a chance on something new.  And almost all my regrets come from the times I wimped out and stuck with the comfortable and easy choice.  As I’m returning from another great week at Sanibel, I’m so glad I chose to come here instead of Kentucky thirty years ago.  And twenty years from now, I want to be just as glad about the choices I’m making now.

Thoughts on a cold winter morning….

/ Ann Coleman / 4 Comments

DSC03771Lately, I’ve been thinking that one of the best things about being middle aged is knowing that the retirement years are finally on the horizon.  My husband’s, that is, not mine.  But if all goes well, he should be able to retire sometime in the next five to ten years.  And that means we will finally be able to spend the entire month of January in Florida, enjoying the sunshine instead of battling the cold, snow and ice of a typical midwest winter.

I’m tired of lying in bed for at least ten minutes after I wake up every morning, trying to work up the nerve to get up and face yet another frigid day.  When I finally do drag myself out of bed,  I bundle up in several layers (long underwear has become my new favorite piece of clothing), warm up the car and head down to the Humane Society to help the other volunteers walk the forty-some housebroken dogs who are patiently waiting for their morning potty break.  In my weaker moments, I think about just not going.   But I know that only means that the other volunteers will have even more dogs to walk, and I don’t want to do that to my friends.  Plus, they know where I live.

So for now, I take comfort in hoping that it won’t be too many more years before I’m spending my January mornings in Florida, where I belong.  I’ll wake up, hop out of bed immediately, put one some light-weight clothes and go for a stroll on the beach, stopping now and then to pick up a pretty seashell.  I really believe that time is coming, and dreaming of it is what keeps me going through this long, cold and dreary month.

In the meantime, if anyone knows how to make an indoor dog toilet, please leave the instructions in my comment section.  Seriously.