The novelty of adulthood still hasn’t worn off on me. Married life feels like a permanent sleepover party, on weekdays no less, and I still feel rebellious every time I buy sugar cereal. Sometimes, I will even skip breakfast altogether and I won’t put my hat on when it’s cold outside. There really is nothing better than being a grown up and making your own bad decisions.
Recently, after spending hours crafting a budget and putting ourselves on a strict financial diet, my husband and I proceeded to book a trip to an all-inclusive resort in the Mayan Riviera. We planned to go with three other couples and while we knew we shouldn’t spend the money, as we all enter our child bearing years, who knew when we would be able to travel together again? Most persuasively, besides Visa, there was no one to tell us we couldn’t go.
Growing up, ours was the family that always stayed home during winter break. Every December, while I watched all my classmates travel to such exotic locations as their grandparents’ condos in Fort Lauderdale, I really couldn’t think of anything more glamorous. Traveling, to me, represented exceptional opulence available only to royalty and my wealthy private school friends. My generous parents, on the other hand, sacrificed fancy cars and relaxing vacations to send my brothers and I to private school. As a twenty-nine year old, I am extremely grateful for their hard-work. At the time though, I really wanted to go to Disneyland. And so, as my friends invariably returned to school sun-kissed, I returned green with envy.
With such hectic, grown-up schedules, I long for time away to take a collective breath with my husband but I just can’t get used to the notion that I am permitted to take a trip if I want to. I never feel like I have earned it and our Mexican jaunt was no different. As I packed my suitcase, I started to feel immensely guilty about our frivolous decision. Having already spent the money on what was supposed to be a relaxing holiday, I started to feel guilty about feeling guilty. With bikinis I prayed still fit sprawled out around me, I sat on my luggage panicking. I have just never been any good at treating myself. I am consumed with worry and can’t seem to shed my parents’ preaching of hard work and holiday conservatism.
After their painful divorce, however, my parents each developed an urgent need to see the world. Whether it was the fact that their children were grown and educated, the influence of their new partners or a sense of competitive one-upmanship that comes with separation, I don’t really know. But somehow, my anxious, just ‘stay-put’ mother, who had previously ventured only as far as my grandmother’s rented apartment at Bathurst and Steeles, made her way to Kanchanaburi, Thailand with her handsome boyfriend. Giddy with romance and jet lag, my mother told me I really ought to see the Bridge over the River Kwai when I get a chance. My mother said this as if she just happened to stumble upon it. As if she were telling me to go and get the Clinique bonus at the Bay. After a long pause, she interrupted my astonishment. “You know,” she said, her voice cutting in and out of the Thai static, “it’s really important to travel with your partner.”
I think about my mother’s revelation, the closest she ever came to expressing any sort of regret. I think about it as I run in the ocean at my poor husband forcing him to attempt a recreation of the Dirty Dancing lift. Just as I jump out of the surface my bikini bottoms slip off me with the water, exposing my white tush to the entire beach and what feels like to me, all of Mexico. Through salty coughs, I hear my friends’ peels of laughter. I take my husband’s steady hand as I gingerly slide back into my bottoms. Standing with him, smiling, in the middle of the ocean, I realize that my mother was right. Traveling with your partner is priceless.
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