COUNTDOWN TO ECSTASY (May into June 2010)
Words can not begin to describe what the last week of school was like, to hear people talk about their Italian experiences, and just plan hold on to emotions, and make it through the week. Every reference to anything remotely Italian, made my pulse pound and my head light and giddy. I could not even fathom concepts like, Saturday we will be sight-seeing in Roma. I mean really--in Rome, Italy! It struck me square over the head during the final awards assembly for the year.
Our Librarian creates a slide show each year as part of a motivational strategy for the Accelerated Reader program; it is part of our schools “Read
Around the World” thing we do, encouraging students to read, make points and guess where in the world we will go next. She cleverly, using Photoshop, takes pictures of the students and faculty and inserts them into existing photos from around the world. This year: Africa, Sweden, Italy and Hawaii. She knew about of impending trip and stuck me into shots of the Forum or Coliseum. Here’s ‘doofy’ Dave in Rome. How silly. I laughed, as did the whole assembled school. Then it hit me. That same “in the gut’, ‘wake-up this is a really real life” thing that said I will be there on Friday. In four days I will be somewhere totally different, doing things that we had planned for months. It was really going to happen.
We had to purchase a new take on bag, because the one we had used in the past was to big now. We were hoping everything that we had tried to get into the other one, now discarded along with many things that weren’t going to make it on the trip, would fit into it. Monday night—work late to make up for the time I wouldn’t be at work. Marianne got the dog a hair cut. She had come home Friday bitterly complaining about her hair cut on Friday.
The weather finally broke like it was summer and the end of school. The teachers were finding it hard to tell me when their kids would show up or as in the case of one, go to the awards assembly in her stead so she could have a break. There were field days scheduled in every possible place. With the forecast for no rain and higher temperatures, a repeat of the previous June (completely rained out) was not likely. My second school announced a last minute assembly and my plans for those students fell through. The year was really winding down.
Tuesday, Marianne got a manicure and pedicure, a total luxury for her, and then went to a theatre board meeting. I stayed home and mowed the lawn—I think this is where the story began. As I mowed the early June wet grass, my mind kept going back to that June day a year ago when we decided to through chance to the wind and go to Italy (for a week). Although it had stretched into over three weeks, the vision was still clear—Italy. The adventures that awaited us were so palatable I could hardly contain myself. “Oh the places we will see and the people we will meet”—Dr. Seuss.
Now all that was left on the ‘to-do’ list was ‘packing’, ‘paying’ the last of the bills, and closing down the house. The cell phone had come in the mail and our house sitter was ready to come on board. Then “whoosh”, it was Wednesday after school and we were putting bags into the car and saying goodbye to the pets.
Marianne declared that I would not be emptying the hot tube, “If you haven’t done it yet, you aren’t going to be doing it the night before we leave. Just toss a lot of chlorine into it and it will be there when we get back”.
I didn’t argue. We were going to Italy!
THE END
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