Real You vs. Vacation You

Aug 23, 2024

I went on vacation. I sucked the marrow out of leisure. I sat on a porch swing and rocked to wind chimes. I left my hair unwashed. The sun rose, waved, wandered, rested within the blue blanket of the sky.

I went on vacation. Mosquitos made a supper club of my limbs. Everywhere we went, my niece, three years old, demanded piggybacks. The cashier at a bookstore smiled as we passed.

You have a beautiful daughter.

Oh no, she’s my niece.

Ah! Well. I’m sure someday you’ll have a beautiful daughter, too.

He smiled, a feather-capped smile, a trust-me-I’m-handing-you-a-winning-lottery-ticket smile. I held the scoff in my throat.

I went on vacation. A local tour company’s trolley stopped in front of our rental every night, right around eight. Faces pale and porcelain, jellyfished, shining through its windows. Ruth Lundberg lived here, said the guide. His microphone was loud, demanding. Ruth Lundberg died here. It was a ghost tour.

A quick search of the pocket library (the smartphone) tells me this is correct on technicality. No flag thrown on this play. Yet it’s a forced smudge of the story, a fingernail chipping dried paint. Ruth died of tuberculosis. The year was 1901. An ending, fragile and final, but not uncommon. You, too, can turn someone’s period into an ellipsis for the low, low ticket price of $29.99.

I went on vacation. I ate dessert for breakfast. Cherry cream cheese french toast. Waitresses never stopped pouring coffee. They wore plaid aprons. They wore polite grins. Minimum wage grins. Corners ever upturned, never reaching their eyes.

I went on vacation. Day two and the family rented a pontoon. Lovely day, let’s take it out into the bay. The afternoon gliding by on seagulls’ wings. Some fishing, some snacking, some tunes. Suddenly we’re pulling up anchor. The water has awoken, has turned to anger. Mirror waves now four foot swells, make that five. We are not in Kansas anymore. This is a dangerous turn, a capsizable question mark. We have a baby on board. A literal three-week old baby. Quickly, silently, we adjust. We make for homebase. Meet the waves at forty five degrees angles. Rev up the engine, now slow it down. Hit it just right. Do it again, and again. Hold mom’s hand, she’s as white as the gulls. Nearly an hour but we make it back to dock. Now, in hindsight, it’s funny in its own way — we were so scared, all but the kids forgot to put on their life vests.

We go on vacation. We yearn. We idolize. We arrive. We leave.

We take the photos. We walk the streets. We sit in the wicker restaurant chairs. We sleep between unfamiliar sheets. We have conversations with strangers, speaking in tones kept usually on library reserve. The nights are silky, the middays bright and wide.

We go on vacation. Something is never quite in our grasp but have another drink and you don’t mind anymore, not really, maybe.

We go on vacation. We put on new selves like putting on pairs of shoes. Today open toed, open minded. Today, throw out the rules. It’s five o’clock somewhere. You are anew and you are here and you can choose who you want to be, who you want to cosplay, what you pay attention to, where to fit and refit. You are the liminal outline of all your idealized selves. A body well fed and well stretched. A brain present. A heart steady, thumping, yours.

We go on vacation. We slow. We observe. We linger. We then tire. We feel exposed. Something we need to understand drips through the gaps between our fingers. The time too wide, the space too porous. The anchor too small for the boat. We question our choices, our motives. We crave our own bedsheets. We think how nice it would be, oh so nice, to sit on our couch and watch our shows. We miss someone. We miss many someones. We rescind. We return. We go on vacation. Wash, rinse, repeat.

I went on vacation. I thought of forgiveness, pleasure, purpose. If you stare at the sunset on the horizon, if you hold onto it for too long, the buttered edges begin to bleed. You can hear it, the boil of the water. Liquid flames licking molten silver. Scarlet clouds passing without a second glance. If you squint, it looks like smoke, and now so do your hands, which are holding your three year old niece’s, who is smiling at you, right up at you, with love greater than any sum of its parts, who knows nothing but what’s in front of her eyes, what’s beneath her feet, what teases her smile. Who sees the sun and thinks only of warmth.