Robotic Bugs. Homer’s The Odyssey. All Inclusive Amnesia.

I’ll just get right to it.  Here’s my best vacation tip: All inclusive.  I highly recommend it.  It’s more money up front, but you know that feeling you have when you travel and you’re looking at prices on the menu, and they’re like: “Fruit plate with tropical medley, price:  $85 USD plus your first born and the deed to your house,” and you sort of think what a shame I need to eat while on vacation? Well that’s gone.  That feeling is also gone when you swim up to the swim-up bar and there are no less than 25 different tropical drink concoctions called things like “Ativan Amaretto” and “Topless Tequila Sunrise” and “Latin Fireman Lover” and you pass the menu back to the bartender and say “Yes, to all of that.”

If I am ever crazy rich, I will have a swim up bar.  And I’ll make TBZE wear a uniform and serve me cocktails.

I should rewind a bit.  Because it didn’t start out this great.  We took a red eye flight and my restless leg syndrome chose that moment to come back and suggest to my legs that a marathon would be awesome right now.  So my legs slapped a race number on my back and started their usual twitching and buzzing feeling and all I could do was sit in my seat and flex my calves to try and trick them into thinking we were in fact out running a marathon, not stuck in the middle seat.  And then TBZE and I were both crabby when we arrived because he hadn’t slept thanks to all his sleeping issues and I hadn’t slept because I was running a marathon and you can’t sleep and run at the same time.

Oh and here’s a bombshell for you, my ex-husband came with us on vacation too.  What?!  Let me explain.  So on Friday we thought we were leaving at 11 AM.  Correction, I thought I was leaving at 11 AM.  Everyone else, especially the airline thought I was leaving at 11 PM.  What this meant is that I’d done all my packing the night before and when the news came to me that I had to spend the full Friday waiting for my flight, it was like that feeling of suddenly getting off a moving walkway – you’re gliding along, and then the walkway ends, and you realize how badly regular walking sucks.  So we had the whole day in front of us, at home.  That’s when things started to go south.  TBZE took Clyde and Ivy to school, I took Hazel to school.  Then TBZE texted me that the twins were having a really hard time knowing they were going to their dad’s house, and that the preschool teacher suggested I meet the preschool class at the park to say goodbye to spend some time with them.  I went down to the park and stayed with them until it was time to go.  Then Ivy started melting down saying she wanted to go with me, and said that she didn’t want her step mom to pick her up from school, she wanted her dad to.  I knew this wasn’t going to happen, or at least would be highly unlikely, but Ivy made me promise to call her dad and ask.  I said goodbye to them and Ivy kept asking, You promise to call dad? Yes, I told her. I got back in the car, looked at the time and knew there was probably no chance he’d make it, but I texted anyway because I’d promised.  I thought there was an off chance he’d be working from home and could go and get her.  Then I texted their step mom to say that Ivy had been hoping to see her dad today and that she might be a little weepy at pick up.

I went and saw a friend, came back home and started cleaning up the backyard also known as the plastic graveyard (where toys go to die).  During the clean up, I heard my phone make the text message jingle. It was a text from my ex-husband, who never responds to texts, emails or phone calls.  Period.  I generally just hope he gets them.  But respond he did.  I kept scrolling and scrolling and scrolling and the text was so long it made Homer’s The Odyssey look like the Cliff’s Notes for Goodnight Moon.  If that’s a weird analogy, I’ll just spell it out:  really effing long. I generally believe text messages are for things like “Hey baby, can you pick up some taco shells?” or “Did you know babies are born without kneecaps?” or “I ate two donuts really fast and I have to go lie down.” Not a scathing diatribe about how he can NEVER pick up his children because he WORKS and why can’t I get it through my thick head to ALWAYS coordinate with step mom and how dare I hurt her feelings and on and on and on an on it went.  No one can ruin my day like he can; it’s a gift.  Though I was tempted to write him back: “Did you know babies are born without kneecaps?” I took a deep breath, went upstairs and with shaking hands took the cap off my ativan.  Then I waited for that to kick in and decided I would call him to try and talk him down.  Of course he didn’t pick up so I left a calm, ativan-induced message saying that I had only been trying to help and pass along some info about Ivy and though I knew it was unlikely he’d be available, I thought I’d give it a shot.  And I said, these nasty grams of yours are not helpful.

What I always fail to realize is that an apology from him will never come and that I am in fact left with the residue of his rage, and not the good kind you can smoke.  Once we checked into the hotel in Costa Rica we found our room wasn’t ready because we were early so we sat on a patio overlooking the bay and TBZE promptly fell asleep.  And ex-husband took that opportunity to show up in my head like a menace.  I went over and over that stupid text until I couldn’t really pay attention to the lush soft air and the gentle breeze and the turquoise ocean, I could only hear his nasty words.  I realized that what I’d done was take my ex-husband with me on vacation.  Yikes, I thought.  You need to send him back.

I changed into my bikini and found the bar and picked out the most ridiculous mixed drink I could find. Then a guy came and sat next to me and asked for a shot of the best rum they had and it turned out Stan was a psychiatrist which confims my suspicions that even mental professionals need alcohol.

I had three mixed drinks that looked mostly like Slurpees with parasols and then everything was fine.

Anyway.  I like all the wildlife here and the big bugs and the ants that snake down to the beach carrying bits of leaves above their heads like umbrellas.  It’s as though all the bugs here are magnified and so you can see every move they make in detail.  They move like they are computer animated, like robot bugs, which is I suppose why I am so fond of them.  On the beach, lemon yellow butterflies gather by the shore and when you pass them they fly up like confetti.  The sand has a layer of glinting black over the whiter sand and when the water comes up, it takes the layer of black with it and what’s left is a marble pattern.  There is a sweet marmalade cat here, lean and hungry who hangs around the outdoor dinner area at buffet time.  She is friendly because she has figured out being friendly will get her cut up steak fed to her surreptitiously (by me) and fish (by TBZE).  I like her a lot and she has a narrow face and a slinky way of weaving through the table legs and a meow that is almost a pur.  This means it’s a good job we got the all inclusive package so I can have dinner there every night and feed her a steak dinner.

I think we’ll go down to the beach and maybe I’ll bring The Cross Dressers sent to me by The Bloggess.   I’ll bring sunscreen and trashy magazines and my sunglasses and of course TBZE.  But not the ex – I put him in a cab already.  He’s going back on the red eye.  In cargo.

Tagged as: anxiety, better living through chemistry, Clyde, cross dressing lego, divorce, ivy, the bloggess