Winter has arrived!  Time to get out of Michigan if you can.  For as long as I can remember, I have been one of those people that take leaving on vacation to the extreme.  Washing every piece of clothing I own, running the dishwasher at the very last minute and cleaning the refrigerator.  Guaranteeing that if I were to not make it home, my family would at least find a clean house.  In addition to a cleaning frenzy; there has always been 101 things I needed to do to cover my job(s).  Usually leading me to question whether being gone for a few days was really going to be worth all the work it took to get there.  Not to mention the agony of playing catch-up when you return.  Sound familiar?

I just enjoyed a week in the Florida Keys with four other retired women.  I must say it was very different from my previous vacations.  For one thing, I only had to worry about myself.  That itself was pretty nice after the last two years.  I also had a limited number of things to do beforehand.  With the business sold, I still prepared my final 941, W-2’s and 1099’s before I left but no more worries about customers, ordering, scheduling and payroll.  Excellent!  I did all the laundry but left the dishes and refrigerator since Scott was staying home.  Baby steps.   

Friday arrived and the adventure began with the alarm went off at 2:30 a.m. The flight to Miami, then to Key West was originally scheduled to leave at 9:00 a.m. but was pushed up to 6:00 a.m. to avoid the threat of the incoming storm of the year.  Two gals had booked a different flight stopping first in Chicago.  The airline decided against flying into the eye of the storm and rerouted to Newark; with the change leaving one of my girls in the dust and one on the new flight arriving in Key West five hours later than me.  So much for planning.  I think it was then that I realized that I wasn’t going to worry about it.  I would get there when I got there and there was no reason to fret – I was retired.  Even better, if we were unable to return because of the storms, that didn’t matter either.  We were all retired!

Ultimately, two of them picked me up at the airport and the other arrived only an hour or so after me.  Sadly, our fifth gal didn’t have it so easy.  She made it out the next afternoon but after several delays her plane left Grand Rapids at the same time her connecting flight to the Keys was leaving from Newark.  The plus-side was a comped hotel room with food and drink vouchers.  She finally arrived on Sunday.  Let the party begin!

Vacationing as an “elder” being, is much like vacationing as a toddler.  Rising early; eating, swimming, napping, eating some more.  Then going to bed early.  And after consuming copious amounts of liquids throughout the day; getting up during the night to use the bathroom.   We enjoyed the sun rising through the palm trees over the channel, followed by breakfast prepared by our hostess’s husband.  Her newest grandchild and his parents joined us for breakfast and provided us with lots of time to soak up all the joy that a baby can bring to a room full of grandmothers.  Eventually shedding our vacation “mu-mu’s” for swimsuits and hitting the pool. 

Being January, it was still a little cooler there.  We ended up with two good sun tanning days.  That’s still two more than they had at home.  We had lots of laughs.  Most of them at our own expense.  Imagine five mature women with similar “generous” builds.  All with shades of hair ranging from golden blond to grey; all bobbing in the pool.  Hoping that a little water aerobics would zero out the snacks and beverages we seemed to have in front of us at all times.  Enter the baby.  We all go bobbing to the other end of the pool to welcome him. Talking baby talk, all vying for his attention in hopes of being the first to bring a smile to his face or hear him giggle.   This is where we are at.  We joked that when he is old enough to go to the zoo or aquarium, he will be asking where the tank of old ladies is!  Maybe you had to be there; but it was funny. 

Along with the daily struggles of what bathing suit will I wear today was the need for lists.  Remember back when you used to make lists of things you had to do?  Or lists of great ideas that you want to develop into reality some day when life slowed down?  Those aren’t the lists we were making.  We actually took pen to paper for our grocery list.  Call it pride, but we couldn’t bring ourselves to write down our second list.  You know the one – hey when you go in the house – can you bring me……. With beverages and such happening, it was only a matter of time before someone had to dry off and go upstairs to the bathroom or refill a beverage or snack tray.  We probably managed half of what we went in for and passed the responsibility on to the next person.  CRS is real at this stage of life.   But it’s vacation, so who cares. 

Another challenge with traveling with five mature ladies is the ever-present reality that one of us has to sit in the way back.  And more importantly, be able to extract themselves when we get to our next location.  As the youngest, that fell to me a few times and I was grateful to have been doing chair yoga since the new year.   I won’t even go into the exorbinate amount of time it took us to get ready to load up and go any where. I think they call it herding cats? 

Participants weathered additional scheduling changes but as before, we all made adjustments and carried on.  In between eating and swimming we did some shopping and took a couple boat rides.  We ended our trip with a stay in a hotel on the beach in South Miami.  Probably not something I would recommend unless you can stay up past 9 p.m. to enjoy the night life. What they get for those rooms is crazy but it was an fun experience and we can say we did it. 

My greatest blunder happened during the last leg of the journey.  After about 30 minutes in the TSA line, I decided it was time to pull out my electronic boarding pass.  A method I never use because my phone is typically dead every time I really need it.  With no printer in our hotel room, I decided it was time to make sure my phone was fully charged and give technology a try.  Live on the edge.  And fall off the cliff.  As you are probably surmising, my phone was no where to be found.  I exit the line and tear apart my bag, frantically looking for my phone.  Nothing.  A lady offered to call me; we heard nothing.  Hopefully the girls would hear it ringing in the back seat and realize that I had left it.  I decide to try and print a boarding pass with my passport.  Nope, can’t do it without your flight confirmation code.  So off to join the check-in lane.  With the whole world gone electronic, I realize there are no clocks in the airport. I guess knowing the time won’t speed up the line any way. Retrospectively, I was pretty chill for someone who didn’t have a phone to communicate with anyone and was most likely going to miss their flight.  Partly due to the fact that I never saw the notification that the flight was moved up and we had gotten there late to boot.  Now had I also lost my glasses and passport; that would have been a much different story. 

I finally made it to the front of the line and explained that I had lost my phone and therefore also my boarding pass.  She cheerfully reported that she could print one since I had my identification.  Perfect.  Then she pulls up my flight.  She makes an interesting face and says “You do know that your flight leaves at 12:25?”  Well that might be but, still, here I am.  What do you suggest?    Good news was that I wasn’t planning on checking a bag and it was too late any way.  She quickly scanned the room and said – follow me.  She rounded the service counter and briskly walked me over to the front of the TSA line and told them that I had to go – now.  She adds, “After you’re through TSA, take a left.  With the tram down, it’s a bit of a hike. If you keep moving, hopefully you will make it.”  In my flip flops.  Perfect. Despite it all, I made it; and my phone arrived back in Michigan on Wednesday. It was of course promised to arrive by Monday. Again, not that it matters; I’m retired!   Que, Sera, Sera. I think it’s finally sinking in!