There was a time when I could have given lessons in vacationing. I was a superlative vacationer.

Not everyone is. When I was a young mother, I went on vacation with a friend to a beach house. My first response was to pop open a beer, park myself in a chaise lounge and listen to the ocean waves.

To vacate means to leave your mind somewhere else. To forget about everything you were before you went on vacation

Her first response was to sweep.

The woman could not stop sweeping and mopping.

Then there was my vacation from Hades. I didn't know the family we were going to be sharing a house with all that well. All I knew was that she had asked us to share a beach house for a week and I needed a dose of the beach. I knew things would be shaky when, before we left, Bambi asked what kind of casseroles I would bring.

Bambi, darling, I do not go on vacation to eat casseroles.

I go on vacation to lie on the warm sand and drink margaritas or pina coladas, preferably served to me, oceanside.

To vacate means to leave your mind somewhere else.
To forget about everything you were before you went on vacation.

Bambi did not know how to vacate.
She brought a wave machine on vacation to the beach
To help her sleep.

All night I heard her waves instead of the real ones.
(I wanted to kill her!)

And to make it even worse, another friend was on the same island at the same time with a great friend, and an au pair and they had cocktails every evening while they watched the sunset!

I watched Bambi's casseroles in the microwave.

That was the first in what was a series of some definite vacation bummers.

And Bambi was not on them.

No-- my kids were. One spiked a 104 temperature for our night in a b and b, another broke her ankle running away from a sand crab….

There's no getting around it: kids put a major dent in vacations.

Even when the kids are well.

Kids do not like their parents to vacate around them, or even near them.

Kids want their parents to
Be available!
Food, talk, games, things, kids need us and need us and need us….

Even on vacation.

Still I could get over that.

But I have to work this summer. My hubby has to work.

My kids are home and we're home.

So with my superlative vacation skills, I am learning the art of enjoying what is at hand.

I have made a kiddy pool in the front yard.
I lie in it with a beer.

The kids go to their friends' houses.
Those mothers have casseroles available.
(thanks Valerie and Joyce)

I do not envy my friends who are going to Findhorn and Costa Rica, who are getting pedicures at the Hamptons.

No. I will not die bitter.

I sit in my kiddy pool next to my husband.
Our five- year- old pretends our little kiddy pool is an ocean.
And I realize: Vacation is about vacating so that you can see something for the first time as if it is the only time.

And I appreciate this water
And this bottle
And this husband and this child.

(And the fact that I don't have to listen to anybody's wave machine.)