In the White Mountains

August 12 to 19, this year, we take Bill's daughter, Caitlin, who is 13, to Purity Spring. It's a homey, old-timey inn and resort. In the winter, it's King Pine Ski area, but now it's just Purity Spring. It's a really cozy and pleasant place, especially with kids, since the management doesn't actually care if your toddler is loud and messy in the dining room. That isn't to say you can't have a romantic grownup vacation there - you just have to plan to eat a little on the late side, cause you know, those kids are always hungry and drag their parents into meals the minute they smell the mac and cheese.

In any case, my three kids, now adults, practically grew up there. We went for at least a week every year, the same week, with family and friends, and other families/ couples/singles from around the country and from Canada came the same week every year, so we got to know them all and looked forward, from one summer to the next, to seeing them. When I got divorced from Jeff, the annual use of our special room became, for a while, an issue of contention - I won - haha! I continued to take my youngest child up at the appointed week, I went up also with two boyfriends at various times. Recently, my children returned for a small family reunion there, and they say the place hasn't changed much. We're making this trip because, in a moment of insanity, I suggested it, and Bill rarely says no to me!

So I anticipate my return, with Bill and Caitlin. I contacted my Canadian friends, urging them to consider coming down oat of up north (no, that's not a spelling error-just how they speak), but couldn't convince them, so it's just us three. We're not getting the big, expensive room in the building with the water mill next to the dam that holds back the clear, drinkable lake water. The Mill building used to be, when I first started going there, a falling-down barn with signs warning me to keep out. It was renovated to relative luxury, and now houses a good gym, and nice pool, and three nice bedrooms with fridges and microwaves. My extended family used to take the building over on "our" week, and I've had up to 7 people sharing our room when my kids were young and brought friends. Instead, we've booked a smaller space in another, older building, and I'm hoping to get the room I remember that has a little sleeping nook arranged so that there's a tiny bit of visual privacy at night. Bill's been asking me how we're going to find time to be alone. We're pretty old, but we are, after all, still sort of newlyweds. In any case, I've him he can just forget about it.

Now, when I'm with Caitlin, I don't take on a mother's role, nor do I think I act like a friend. She lives in a female-centric home and is isolated from her father by her mothers animosity toward him and by her stage of life - now is the time for her to conspire with her friends not to let either parent know too much about her or get too close. For me to be too motherly, or too friendly, would be a challenge to her loyalty and an insult to her adolescence. I only attempt to exercise authority over my property and premises, and don't attempt to tell her how to do things, nor encourage her to share feelings. She was 9 years old when I met her, and I don't see her that often. She resists intimacy with her father, so it would be presumptuous to believe that she'd let me get to know her very well. My feeling is, I'm just around. As she gets older, if she likes me (and by the way, I like her very much), we can be friendly.

For the moment, I'll be happy if we share a room, in peace, for one, measly week. When we return (or sooner, if things go badly and I have to flee to the computer to vent), I'll let you know how it went, and tell you more about the resort itself.

Traveling Back in Time with Mom-4 days in Delray Beach

The time I'm traveling back through is my own - I am reverting, becoming a child, enduring my mother's attacks.
Did I tell you what we were doing in Delray Beach? Bill and I are shopping, with my mother, for an apartment that she can use in the winter - an apartment WE will pay for. This is happening because, apparently, I have confused emotional business with family business. She likes Kings Point (best clubhouse) and Lakes of Delray, the community she used to own in.
I had misgivings about Kings Point from the beginning. The last time I was there, my father was talking about suicide. I remember the place as dismal, dingy and forlorn, with parking places up against patios and garbage bins in every path. These memories surely were colored by my sad experience there, so I'll keep an open mind, especially since it's so affordable. We house-shop, and I say, "What do you think of this apartment, Mom?" and she answers, "Why do you wear such low-cut blouses? Is this how you want people to think of you? You can't wear your bikinis here you know, the men will go wild!" We spent most of a day moving between car, oppressive heat, cookie-cutter apartments (they were perfectly nice inside), more heat, fatty food, etc. until Bill decided the development looks like a barracks. I could see that my mother was crestfallen, but I had to tell her I agreed. I was, after one day of shopping, furious at her for her comments, furious at myself if I endured them, more furious at myself when I barked back, which I certainly did. On day 2, we looked at Lakes of Delray. I heard more of her litany of criticism, her opinions about what was the best investment I could make (the apartment that she wanted most), her praise of my darling husband who is, in fact, a saint. I found an apartment I liked, he liked, she liked. Guess what? My mother knows the owner from back when she lived in the building across the way. She wants to know if she should call her old friend, or let the broker deal with her. If she calls what should she say? If her friend sees our names on the contract and calls my mother, what should she say? I was now under pressure from the broker to take action. My mother announced she should be the one interviewed by the condo association, since she's a former tenant. She's almost totally deaf. This is not amusing. She would not hear what was asked, she would guess about what she was supposed to be hearing, and answer the question she thought she was asked. Don't think that would go well at all. She wants to advise me about what to pay. She wants to know if I think the real estate attorney is any good - while we're sitting in the chair at the attorney's office. She is amazed at the cost of attorneys. She wants to know why I have my jacket on when it's so hot. She wants to know what she said that's so terrible, because I have stopped responding, and I'm glaring straight ahead.
The next day, we will visit Aunt Rose in Melbourne. This is supposed to be a happy surprise for my mother and my aunt - Bill and I reserved the day for second-looks, but we found an apartment we can all be satisfied with, so the day is free. My mother is truly surprised when we announce our plans the night before. Naturally, we need to call ahead. My mother insists that we tell Rose to make us lunch. My mother is usually the one who hosts her sister; now she wants to be paid back. I ask my aunt, now about 87 years old if she can make us lunch. She is clearly flustered. She has no food in the house except tuna, which I can't stand. I want to pick a pizza up, to make things easy, but Mom's standing next to me as I'm on the phone, telling me it's Rose's turn to make lunch - nothing else will do. And so I insist. After our two hour trip, we arrive, and Rose seems exhausted - she went to the store that morning, in the heat and bought us a roast chicken and some potato salad. When we sit down to eat, the two of them begin to bicker - old angers and dissapointments begin as a thread in the background as they chatter about nothing important, and explode, finally, into an outright shouting fight - they are angry, then crying, hurting each other, and pieces of potato salad are flying out of their mouths, and they seem so terribly, terribly sad and frail and old, and saddest for me, I see between them what I'm feeling between me and my mother.
Three hours after we arrive, we are heading back to Delray and my mother wants to know if she is like her sister, mean and unkind, she means, and I can't say, because she's been mean and unkind to me for so long, and I feel only meanness and unkindness toward her at that moment.
It's Monday, our last day in Florida, when I see the attorney, make the offer, run back and forth with copies, inventory contents of the apartment I want, and finally get on the plane to go home with mom and with Bill, who's been trying to keep me from going off the deep end. I am hoping this deal will fall through (it probably will), and although I have a second apartment in mind, I'm probably not going to make an offer when the time comes.
I can't believe, after all these years, that we trigger each other the way we do - we set each other off like bombs.

I'm shell shocked. I'm back at work, and I just spoke to my daughter on the phone - telling her I hope that in whatever ways I've hurt her, whatever errors in judgment I've made, I hope she can forgive me. She wants to know if it isn't, in any case, time I let go of my anger toward my mother, but I can't say I've grown up enough to do that - unlike my own daughter. This wasn't just four days in Delray Beach looking for a vacation home. It was a very expensive, exhausting and embarrassing trip from my present to my lingering past. I'm still a child with my mother, and this was the worst trip of my life.

Not Traveling Alone

As you can tell from my Sultan commentary, I don't like traveling alone, and won't do it again for a while. I have three trips in the works, and Bill will be there for all of them - Florida, White Mountains of New Hampshire, and a Cruise to Puerto Rico and some other places. But Florida and New Hampshire, well, they involve more than Bill and myself.
Tomorrow bright and early we are heading for Delray Beach, Florida with my mom - 83 years old, nowhere near death, but slow and fragile. We're house hunting in Delray for several days, in the worst heat of the summer, with a woman who can barely see, hears next to nothing. She's diabetic, has poor balance, and is no longer able to conduct a lengthy conversation or follow the logical progression of an argument for very long. She's emotional, defensive, sometimes hostile (and I'm not that nice, either). Since the house we're hunting is for her, we can't actually leave her behind, but I worry that she won't really be able to shop. Now if I didn't have other obligations, and I had all the time and money it takes, I could spend as much time as needed, see a few places each day, help her make a careful decision. But in the space of 5 days (including travel days), we need to see lots of places. We arrive Thursday afternoon and plan to drive around the neighborhoods we're interested in. Friday and Saturday must be concentrated shopping days. Sunday is reserved for second looks, and we come home on Monday afternoon. If we don't see anything good on Friday or Saturday, we'll drive up to visit an elderly aunt in Melbourne. I expect my mother will not hold up well, that I'll be too hot and too short tempered. Bill, of course, will keep either of us from really exploding, but I am truly worried about how to get along sharing one hotel room (Mom and Bill are both very interested in saving a few dollars) for what might be a very, very, very long weekend.
In August, we take Bill's 13-year-old daughter to an inn in Madison, NH (near North Conway). Could this be the opposite of my Florida trip? I remember the days when I took my kids to the country. At that age they truly resisted any involvement on my part in their activities, and I think it will be that way with Caitlin on this trip. So instead of my mom's neediness, whining, and demands, I expect that Caitlin will be whiny and demanding, but that once she gets what she wants, she'll want US to take a hike. I haven't taken a kid on vacation in at least ten years. Mercifully, she is the sort who occupies herself, and if she feels shy, she doesn't show it very much. Where I worry about the trip with Mom, Bill worries about the trip with his daughter - it wasn't his idea, it's for a whole week, he doesn't always like being responsible for her, blah, blah (it's blah, blah when the worry is his, not so with my worries...).
It will be very interesting (at least to me) to see how each of these trips plays out. I'll let you know soon enough.

Sultan, WA July 13-16, 2006

Surprise for me, my son moved there about 6 months ago. Within a span of about two weeks, Drew announced that Nicole was expecting, she missed her family, there was lots of good work in the Seattle area, and then they were gone. The baby was born about 6 weeks ago- Kai Zavier, or Kay Xavier (haven't seen it in writing yet, but I've seen his picture, and he's beautiful, and so is my son). So when Kai was born I didn't rush out, I let the first frantic weeks pass, and I have just returned from my first visit to Sultan (Yes, there's a statue of the Sultan of Sultan WA on a road I didn't get to see).

So here's the first piece of the story - this is my first real, faraway trip without Bill. All my old fears and insecurities are back in full forse in his absence - I couldn't walk into my motel room without Drew accompanying me upstairs, couldn't sleep without pills, could barely take care of myself - ordinary washing and toothbrushin was an ordeal. I had nobody to cry to and I felt terribly alone - here I was seeing my son after so long, filled with emotion that he finds embarrassing, and no Bill to take the edge off. I don't like waking up alone in a strange place, it's as simple as that, and I don't intend to do it again if I can help it.
Look, I love Seattle, which is about an hour south of Sultan, so I went prepared to love the area, and yes, as a vacation spot, it's pretty nice. The town itself, however, is more than a pass-through for me, since Drew lives there, and it has some problems. It looks distinctly not prosperous. Drew tells me there's crime (not violent - robberies, burglaries, etc.) at the same time that Nicole tells me that no, it's not odd that some guy in a truck cruised up to me and told me he just dropped a guy off somewhere and did I need a lift - everyone's friendly here. The grocery store sells outdated food. At least one of the businesses pays its employees in credits for the goods it sells - we're talking furniture and gift items, not food - and the credits are redeemed at the retail price of the goods taken by employees in payment. You can't always get tea with your breakfast here in coffeeville.
From a visitor's point of view, it's a different story. I stayed for about $55 a night, tax included, at the Dutch Cup motel - very run down looking on the outside, no milk with the coffee offered in the morning, but with clean, large, quiet rooms, good TV and comfortable, king-sized beds and very big, fluffy pillows. They don't clean the rooms unless you ask. There are four bars in town, and although I just go home and go to sleep at night, the whole town is busy drinking and karaoke-ing, except for the thieves and burglars. People are friendly - everyone says hello. As a New Yorker, I'm creeped out when the guy I have to pass on the balcony on my way to the motel room tips his hat, smiles, and says "evnen, maam", but I guess I can believe that his intentions were honorable.
The weather was beautiful - we were on the western side of the Cascades, so we had all the advantages of Seattle. It also gets a lot of rain, as Seattle does, and Nicole's father says there's a high suicide rate that he attributes to the chronic dampness and wetness. Sultan is surrounded by national forests, national parks, camping, hunting, fishing, gorgeous lakes and streams, all of which I'll get to see if Drew remains there long enough. I remember this topography and climate well and fondly - a couple of years ago Bill and I spent a late spring touring Seattle, Mt. Rainier, and the Olympic Peninsula.
We drove upstream for about two hours on the 14th, to a town named Leavenworth - a pseudo-Bavarian vacation village where there are actually, people who seem to speak with a German accent. It's a little overdone, pretty expensive, but fun. It looks like a place I could stay for a couple of nights if I were on vacation, rather than visiting. There's actually music playing in the streets all day long - Nicole says they often have oompah bands, but on the day we were there, it was recorded.
If I had the means, I'd love to spend a couple of weeks with a really good camera, driving the roads of the state photographing espresso shacks, and self-publish a book of photos. There are windmills, Bavarian cottages, and a variety of clever shapes to these places, as well as actual shacky-looking things wence cometh, nevertheless, very exotic coffees and shakes. On the way to Leavenworth, we passed one next to a metal hut that was a location for "Harry and the Hendersons".
Back to Sultan - the good things: Well, for one thing, my son and grandchild are there. Gas prices are almost thirty cents a gallon lower than prices here in Queens. There's a terrific bakery (only one - it has a big "bakery" sign outside, high up on a pole). It's the home of the 2002 girls soccer champions. A train goes through, but doesn't stop. The air smells clean.
My evaluation: It's actually a really, really good place to visit, as a stopoff on your way elsewhere, but I definitely wouldn't want to live there.
Next trip is definitely to a place no normal person would choose this time of year - Delray Beach, FL at the end of July, with my frail and elderly mom - I must be insane.