Randy and Shari's World

So last Wednesday was our 10th anniversary. We just got back from a cruise to Bermuda. Well, not quite exactly that, though we’re holding out for that someday.

We were on vacation in the Poconos with my side of the family and it had been arranged beforehand that from after lunch on, my mom would watch our kids and we would go on a Special Anniversary Date for the rest of the day.

Here is what we envisioned for our Big Day:

1) We would rent a jet ski and repeatedly hurl ourselves into the water as we attempted to both stay on at the same time and ride around the lake in a romantic fashion.

2) We would go somewhere pretty and take a nice walk, enjoying beautiful scenery and magical conversation.

3) We would go to the nice lakefront restaurant we kept driving by for the past few days to eat dinner.

4) We would take yet another magically romantic and breathtakingly beautiful walk, probably along the lake.

5) We would go somewhere amazingly yummy to hunt down some magical dessert, of the ice cream based variety.

6) We would eventually wander back to our condo, being reasonably sure the kids were asleep, and take a nice bubble bath, relax a bit, and go to bed.

Here is what actually happened:

1) We drove to a mall in Scranton in the torrential rain, which got so loud that we couldn’t even hear our John Grisham audio book at some points.

2) We shared a Cinnabon, which was FABULOUS – I just LOVE those things and practically cried out loud when our mall (which has TWO Auntie Anne’s, whose pretzels are also fine fare, but come on, two???) took away the Cinnabon.

3) We walked around and purchased the following items: 2 pieces of Gertrude Hawk chocolate and a sympathy card for my sister, who had to leave the vacation for an evening because her favorite kitty, who had been diagnosed with cancer about a year ago, took a turn for the worst and they had to put him to sleep. SO SAD! Timmy was a great kitty, the most laid back cat you could ever meet.

4) We drove back to our condo to pick up our sunglasses because the sun came out for a few minutes and we thought maybe we could still get a walk in. (Editor’s note: we should have just skipped this step).

5) We ate a nice dinner at the rainfront restaurant.

6) We began to take a walk in our raincoats (wearing our raincoats; we were gonna actually walk on the path, see?), got about 8 yards from our car, heard thunder, came back to the car and decided to just sit there and listen to the rest of our audio book. As my sister said later, “Wow! That is REALLY nerdy!”

7) We went to an ice cream place, the kind where you can’t go inside, even if it’s raining, and before we ordered from the nice (and bored) people inside the window hole, decided that we needed to use some bathroom facilities. One of the younger girls behind the window hole told us, with actual glee and giddiness in her manner, that we’d need to “walk through the rain” to get there and then proceeded to give us these really complicated directions to what turned out to be the porta potties out back. So, as I held my husband’s hand and ran through pouring rain to 2 porta potties sitting side by side, I said something to the effect of, “This is not quite how I pictured celebrating our 10th anniversary!!” I mean, we couldn’t even flush!!
We ordered some yummy ice cream from the window people and sat on the sidewalk where it was dry and ate our dessert, while enjoying the view of the parking lot.

9) We went back to our condo, took a bubble bath (well, it was actually a chocolate bath with this stuff that I made at MOPS that was supposed to be for just me I think, cuz we made it at the spa day that was teaching us how to relax and unwind and pamper ourselves as women, but Randy really likes chocolate and we didn’t have anything else, and so there you have it) relaxed a bit, and went to bed.

So you can see some similarities between the two itineraries, but also some striking contrasts. All in all, it was a fun and memorable day. And just so you don’t start thinking not nice things about my husband, he had already planned (before he even knew the forecast) to take me to my favorite place on earth in just a few weeks for an entire weekend!! (Now, if we can just get the childcare lined up…) And though the brochure doesn’t specify, I’m pretty sure there are indoor, flushing toilets there!