Homeward Bound

It has begun. One life over and another begins.

I worked my last week employed as an official eye poker and said goodbye to the friends I made there at St Lucie Eye.  It feels like I have spent an entire week saying goodbye.  I am sadder than I ever thought I would be in leaving Florida.  Despite my terrible attitude about this state, I found myself truly sad as I packed to leave it behind.   It amazes me how quickly the time slipped away from when Dennis and I first decided to try this move to France, to here we are...the condo is packed and Dennis moves everything this weekend.  Conveniently I am currently visiting my parents and sisters in my hometown, having abandoned my patient husband to the horrors of moving.  And then, to make it even worse, my dear Dennis is driving Anna up to RI next week.  He says he will make the trip non-stop in 18 hours....we shall see.

I decided to pack cardboard boxes instead of luggage so that I could get as much for the 100 pounds I was allowed.  Brilliant!  After all, standard luggage on its own weighs ten pounds...that's just ridiculous!  Except that my boxes came out of the luggage conveyor at the airport looking like they had been dropped from the airplane's cargo bay at 30,000 feet.  Not so brilliant after all. I am undeterred.  So a plan B is needed to get my 100 pounds of clothes and shoes to France in 13 days. I'm thinking maybe I just need thicker, stronger cardboard. I will prevail.  Who needs conventional luggage? Not me. Soon everyone will want to be cool like me and bring cardboard to the airport. Who needs Louis Vuitton?

My mother and I spent the morning in the backyard sunning ourselves peacefully, until my sister Jen (otherwise known as the skin cancer/safe sun time police) arrived and began nagging us, like a well intentioned fly.  "zzzzzzzzz I can't believe you two buzzzzzzzz...you guys are such freaks laying in the sun....zzzzz...don't you know how dangerous the sun is?....zzzzzzzzz ...its so hot out there......zzzz".) After a few minutes of that,  I gave it up and Jen and I went out to a local favorite restaurant of mine for lunch.  Walking out to my sister's car I noticed a handsome sock monkey sitting in the backseat, giving my a jaunty smile. His name? Pierre.  We fell in love instantly.  I can't believe I ever lived without him.

So Pierre and I are relaxing in my parents' house as we await our dinner to be ready.  The house is kept at a brisk 65 degrees, so to stay warm I have a hot cup of tea with me, that keeps cooling off before I can finish it. It's 90 degrees outside. I think the windows may ice over soon.

So I am being spoiled while my husband and my dog live out the next few days in a cardboard jungle down in Florida.  I am a terrible person.

A year from now

I am that type of person. The kind who takes things like moments, dates, anniversaries seriously. I stop, reflect...feel sad about the passage of time and wonder about the coming year. The next thing.


Paris.  All I ever wanted was to see Paris.  I would dream of learning French and walking through the streets unconcerned and at home, like a native. I would wander in my mind along cobble stones streets and across bridges, listening to the history of a world I've never know, getting lost in the immensity of it all. 


I've never been to Paris.


I can't speak French 


And yet, in less than a month, I am moving to Roquebrune Cap-Martin, France. 


600 miles south of Paris.


A year and half ago I was living in a room off my parents' kitchen. Not even a bedroom but a living room off my parents' kitchen. With all of my possessions in a 5 x 10 foot storage unit, except for my dog and my shoes and my many many clothes. And my TV.


And now I am married and living in Florida, with my dog and some of the shoes and more and more clothes.  I am trying to pack three months worth of clothes into 2 suitcases that will weigh less than 50 pounds a piece.  Sounds like a math problem that requires paper and a number 2 pencil to figure out. 


Life is wild, if you let it be. If you live without fear or at least without letting fear rule you. I was afraid for years. After dreaming of Paris....I forgot how to dream and I boxed myself in with fear as my only companion. 


I still feel fear. And regret. I still worry about what could have been, or should have been or what I didn't do. And yet, even with all of that, I am moving to France. I am going to learn French. I am going to write more every day. This is what I promise myself, today, June 18. The 34th anniversary of my beginning. I will reach that goal I dreamt of when I was young and poetic and a wanderer of wooded places. In the years when I would sit on the rocks under the trees in the woods behind where we lived and dream of what could be. I will learn French and not be afraid of new places and new things because that girl, that young dreamer reading poetry out loud to the babbling brook at her feet and the chickadees in the branches over head, because she believes in me. http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&pwst=1&q=roquebrune+cap+martin+france&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.&biw=1276&bih=595&um=1&ie=UTF-8&hq=&hnear=0x12cde999c102ce85:0x23682a842cf14aa0,Roquebrune-Cap-Martin,+France&gl=us&ei=ok79Te6tKYnBtgf58u28Dg&sa=X&oi=geocode_result&ct=title&resnum=1&ved=0CCIQ8gEwAA 

Goodbye to Florida

One whole year passed in the blink of an eye.  I can't believe it even as I type it.  Already a week has gone by since Dennis and I crossed the 365 day mark and the time is continuing to whirl past us.

We were able to spend a delicious night and day away in celebration down in Miami at the Ritz on Key Biscayne.  It was romantic and lovely and far too short. We were treated like royalty and I grew accustomed to it all instantly.  The chocolate strawberries, the bottles of champagne, the rose petals everywhere.  From the moment we arrived to the moment we drove away with heavy hearts, every second was bliss. A perfect anniversary gift to each other.  Just the two of us, drinking our frozen cocktails with sand between our toes.

And then our family and loved ones threw us a beach island dream anniversary party complete with shells and sand and a cake decorated in sea blue icing.  It was an evening spent surrounded by those we love and those who love us.  For me the bittersweetness of the evening increases because Dennis and I have only a few weeks left before we leave for France.

We decided, after much thought and sweat and doubt and pro & con lists, that a move to help his mother is what we need to do now. So as of July 11th or so, I will be leaving Florida behind and heading North to be with my family in RI and then off to France for three months.  We hope to make it a permanent move to France, with the three months being the first leg.  We need to discover if we can make money there, have a place to live and many other odd and end decisions before we can say that we are staying for sure.  But our goal is to stay there for as long as Dennis' mum needs us.

It's an incredible idea, one I can't really absorb. Even as I write, I know that I am not fully expressing myself. My heart is at once afraid and thrilled, terrified and impatient to be gone. But one emotion I feel completely is that now my heart will be divided even a little more, because there are some beautiful people here that I will miss very much.  People who have loved me even though I fought this place with every inch of my being. People who have forgiven me for being unreasonably homesick and sweaty for a non-stop year. I have come to love my Florida family of friends and now that I am facing more goodbyes, I am heartsick.  It seems like for me, this whole year of marriage has been a road full of goodbyes.  I want to say hello instead.

Soon I will be saying HELLO to France, my new home. I will carry RI in my blood and Florida in my heart. I hope I can fully express to my newest friends how much they mean to me and how much I am going to miss them. Their kindness and comfort, their patience with me. One way or another, we will return, if only to visit again in September.  But I hope they all know that I am grateful for their friendships and sorry to have to leave them, no matter where I am headed. I refuse to grow used to saying goodbye.

Best of Friends

I am sitting at my desk and through the closed door I can hear my husband and his best friend Ed laughing as they watch Superman (the original movie) and The Marx brothers.  They seem to have their own language. You know, the language of friends that have been together since the first grade.  Dennis and Ed have literally been friends for fifty years. How rare is that?

I've had some close friends, some I thought I'd had forever.  But nothing as remarkable as what these two have.  They've moved across country together and through kids and marriage and jobs, they laugh together like they are six years old still.  Almost as if being together brings them back to an easier time, an innocent time.  When baseball and penny candy was the most important thing in your day.  And shouldn't that be the way of things?  Why can't we keep things that simple?

I am reflecting on my close, forget time and just laugh kind of friends now, as I sit here waiting for my toxic nail polish to dry, wondering if I am going to regret this color choice come morning's first light.

My one friend who makes me a fish stick wrap with american cheese and ketchup and the best coffee I've every had and its the best food I've ever tasted... and we can slip right into a conversation that feels like its never ended, and laugh about the craziness of how our lives have gone. She is the one who always comes to my rescue.

Then my other friend who makes the perfect cocktail, who always guesses right on my musical mood and who can talk me through or around just about anything, who always takes my side and who can just sit by me in companionable silence with the comfort only an old friend can bring. Like oxygen, I breath easier with her.

Or another friend I have who's calm existence is so overpowering that within minutes the tumult that is my mind slows down to a crawl and nothing seems so terrible any more.  Like a Valium to my soul, this friend's calmness steals over me and I am able to stop the whirring.

Or my sister who makes me laugh like nobodies business, who understands me right away, without any preface to my story. She is right on target before I even can get the words out, she knows.  She is my oracle.

Or my sister who is the poet in my heart kind of friend, who makes me believe in magic again and dreams and fairy dust.  She is eternally youthful to me, reminding me that anything is possible if you hold on to your hope. My role model friend

Where would we be without friends like that? The ones who take our sides, who know just what we need. Who run into the battle and never hesitate or  count the cost but would rather fight beside you and for you and defend you, even if you are your own worst enemy.

I can look back over my life and see exactly where each one of these friends scooped me up and saved me, from the most dramatic events to the seemingly mundane.  Life is worth the mess because of the people we get to love and know.  Here is to friendship, like Dennis and Ed, friendship that never stops, never changes and never quits. Here's to laughing until you snort. Here's to eating a whole roasted chicken together. Here's to laying on the kitchen floor in your friend's house and just waiting for things to make sense...and knowing that your friend will wait there beside you.  Here's to chickens someday having lips!

Dennis and I recently spent the weekend at an all inclusive resort with Dennis' son and daughter-in-law. We were pampered and overfed while the natives served us and no doubt went home at the end of the day to a tiny palm hut. At least that's what I imagined..

When Alisha and I arrived at the airport in Santo Domingo I knew right away that we were going to have an adventure. The exit from passport control was lined and overflowing with people, young, old and in between.  Along with dogs, monkeys and chickens. Ok the last part I fabricated but it could easily have been true. Through the pushing, shouting, teaming throng of people, my step-son's face came into view and we dove towards him.  Once outside the airport we hiked over to the Dollar car rental where Dennis had just worked out an upgrade for our car....check it out! Luxury!

Off we go, driving toward our resort, through crazy traffic, dodging scooters with entire families piled high and yes, even a chicken or two in tow.

Eventually we made it without anything tragic occurring and without hitting anyone as they dove in front of our car. We also were able to avoid getting into a car crash despite repeated close calls as there don't appear to be any traffic laws that are observed here. Careening is acceptable in every situation. As is carrying automatic rifles.

The beach, the resort, our room, everything was beautiful.  But I couldn't help but notice the HUGE amount of waste that inevitably happens at places like that. The food is constantly available and there are MASSIVE amounts of people to eat it. Not that the food was tasty or even anything close to that, its just so plentiful,  sitting there asking to be stuffed in your face and it became apparent that most of the visitors had locked their self-control in the in-room safe when they arrived.

There were plenty of topless women and men in leave-nothing-to-the-imagination-Speedos.  But you found yourself cringing and quickly averting your eyes in order to keep your breakfast down.  Any staring at them was purely out of horror, much like when you pass a terrible traffic accident on the highway...you don't want to look but you can't help but stare.

We kept ourselves quite busy by turning our chairs to match the movement of the sun along with getting up often to refill our frozen drinks. Instead of having the bartender mix you a drink, this resort left bottles of rum and vodka next to the drink machines and just gave you free license to make your own concoction. Most of the trip is a little foggy for me still.

 

When turning our chairs and getting drinks became too easy for us, we challenged Johnny and Alisha to a race to the tiny island out in front of the beach. We won, mostly because we kayaked and they chose to paddle boat.  They chose poorly.

We enjoyed two dinner experiences in the restaurants. One night we couldn't eat fast enough to please the staff and it felt more like a food competition in some sort of local island Olympics rather than a relaxing vacation dinner. Plus the AC wasn't working so I ate soaking wet the entire time. All that was missing from that meal was a bell to announce the end of each round.

The next night was the complete polar opposite. We waited at our table for an hour before our entree was served. They were packing the place up and we hadn't even had our dessert served yet. It felt like the twilight zone.

All in all, we had a wonderful two days. It was quick but just enough for us to get some sun and feel the sand between our toes.  I left feeling tired and guilty for being a fat, lazy white girl who stuffed her face endlessly and who threw away enough food to support a local family for a year. All in all, a successful weekend trip!

Create a Guest Room....STAT!

What is it about having people over the house to stay that creates cleaning and organizing monsters out of all of us?

Our friends Kyria and Alan are arriving tomorrow and the past few weeks we have talked and planned out what we need to do to our guest room so that it will be ready.....and we talked about it...then we discussed it over dinner one night....then we mentioned on a Sunday morning as we drove to the beach....and then...after doing nothing for weeks and weeks...

Oh My God!!! They arrive in only 3 days and we have a mess to sort out. Now we kick it in to high gear...we eat, sleep and breath the guest room.  We drop plans, we stay up until the wee hours of the morning, we sweat and cry and work with blood running into our eyes (Okay that was too far but you get the idea)...we run around like fools trying to whip the room into shape. I think I've gone to Walmart and Target a trillion times in 3 days. Well, at least 50 times but it felt like way more, even though I used the self check out.

But let me say with a certain degree of pride, the room is lovely now. It isn't even a shadow of the nasty holding tank of everything we don't know what to do with that it was before. I'm feeling some pride I do admit.  I hope our friends enjoy the room as much as we enjoy walking into it and cooing over it every night. "Look how nice the room looks at this time of day" "How sweet, look at the room"  Like proud parents we just beam every time we talk about our guest room. "Babe, guess what I discovered about the room today" I excitedly tell Dennis the moment he comes home last night.

Sad but true, it would seem I am smitten with the guest room.   We may end up sleeping in there from now on. It looks so much better than our room. Poor neglected master bedroom.  Master of what? The new guest room is all the rave and poor dreary master bedroom has been forgotten....until I sink into the king size bed and then I remember why I love master bedroom so much. Guest room with queen bed who?

Please Sire, let it be German

A night at the Opera in Monaco.  Who gets to do that? Only people who wear furs and drive expensive cars and speak with accents and shout things like "BRAVO".  And then you have me.

Dennis took me out to see Salome' by Richard Strauss on the gala night, in Monaco, Monte Carlo.  It is based upon the story of Herod and his wife Herodias and her daughter Salome' right about the time John the Baptist found himself imprisoned and about to lose his head.

So off we head into Monte Carlo in our Mercedes circa 1980...with its rattling muffler and crazy loud diesel engine.  We were fabulous.  After parking below ground we surfaced to Monaco at night by the Casino, the Hotel de' Paris and the Cafe de' Paris. Oooolalala.  Everyone was tux-ed and furred.  It was a PETA nightmare.  I am sorry to say that many animals were killed in the clothing of Monaco that night.  Everywhere I looked there were bejeweled beautiful women draped in dead animals. And men in tuxes and pointy snake skin shoes. The Opera house was gilded and gold leafed, with ornate carvings and paintings of naked women and angles. Naturally.




Now let me just say that this was not my first rodeo. I have opera-ed before.  I was ready or so I thought.  Little did I know that the operas I have enjoyed have been Italian and until this night in Monaco I never knew why it would matter.  Why, for example, would it matter to see an opera set in Jerusalem sang in GERMAN.  mmmmmmm??. Would I even notice?  Yeah..turns out, I noticed.  Sitting in the second row I had an amazing view of the actors as the sang and/or spit their way through a dramatic and passionate performance.  And with the German language, there was quite a bit of spitting. I wonder if the furs were adversely effected by all the moisture in the opera house that night.

But it was breathtaking being there, experiencing the music played so flawlessly and the performance itself was amazing. An hour and 45 minutes long without break or intermission. An incredible feat.

Afterwards, we walked to our new favorite spot, a hotel Dennis knows well, just around the corner with views of the water and live music.  We ate tiny desserts and sipped cocktails while we watched the people and the lights on the water.