August 2019 – Life Aboard the Traveling Circus

Before I started dating Mike about four years ago, I had never dated anyone who I really went on any dates with.

Sure, I had boyfriends, some serious, some not-so-serious, but for the most part, they all fell into the same (trash) basket – we hung around the house with most planned outings organized by me, while these boys seemed pretty content to hang out on the couch. Day trips often seemed like an impossible, enormous endeavor.

However, it quickly became evident to me during my rampant succession of dates with Mike after we met in 2015 that this was not normal. Every time we went out, it was to a place that was new! exciting! different! (Cringeworthy, right?)

Continue reading “The same dog days of New Hope, Penn., four years later”

The sun is shining, lost tourists are breezing around on bicycles and seagulls are chirping as we finally pull into the Quarterdeck Motel in Wildwood, New Jersey for the almost-seventh year in a row (one year skipped). However, even after the fitting relief that comes from arriving from your destination after a three-hour drive, something is definitively different.

For all of these years, Sandra and I have been coming to Wildwood for two or three nights in the summertime. It began as a couples’ trip with our then-boyfriends – two breakups later, we now do the same itinerary, minus two people, despite both of our new ‘taken’ statuses.

There’s something incredibly comforting about this trip. Usually, I spend the before-days of my other vacations reading guidebooks, planning restaurant outings and checking out reviews online. But when we go to Wildwood, our itinerary remains pretty much the same, with a few safe detours.

Continue reading “Are we too old for this trip?”