Thanksgiving

Best Thanksgiving Ever

 in Gratitude / Snowbirding / Wildlife/animals  tagged beach house / Dolphins / Emerald Isle / family / North Carolina / Thanksgiving by

A few years ago I managed to gather our family in a beach house on North Carolina’s Emerald Isle for Thanksgiving week.  I’m still overjoyed when I think of it.  We walked the beach, played in the waves, collected lost treasures, watched dolphins, danced, cooked, explored the island, and bonded.  Some met our baby granddaughter or new son-in-law for the first time.  Our three-year-old grandson met the ocean.  He ran 50 yards to escape an incoming wave.  How was he to know how far that wave would chase him?  My mother, who was still adjusting to life without her husband […]

What’s to be Grateful For?

 in Gratitude / Our Quest / Spain  tagged Celebrity cruise line / challenges / cruise / Infinity cruise ship / support / Thanksgiving / travel by

For over 10 years I’ve been pushing, pulling, pleading, and praying to get a gig lecturing on cruise ships. With a whole lot of help from some priceless folks, THE day finally arrived. Except, thanks to an ice storm/flight delay, I missed the boat. I stood at the Denver airport customer service desk and watched my dream go Titanic. I couldn’t rebook a ticket to the next port without approval from the cruise line. I couldn’t hold up the crazy-long line while I tried to contact my agent, and she tried to contact her contact. I couldn’t even get my […]

Suffering Sweetness

 in Florida / Newfoundland / Peru / Wildlife/animals  tagged blackflies / bloodsuckers / butterfly / butterfly garden / Florida / Minnesota / mosquitoes / New Foundland / Peru / Thanksgiving / ticks / travel by

After a walk in a Minnesota park I glanced at my shoes and started tearing my clothes off.  Ticks were swarming my laces, storming my socks, and breaking ground on my shins.  The battle was epic.  In Florida, mosquitoes ravaged my legs right through my leggings until I looked like I’d been kick-boxing cactus.  In Newfoundland, heavy clothes helped, but blackflies left knots all over my neck.  Then a Peruvian butterfly garden specimen perched on my arm and begin shoving its proboscis at my skin…drinking my sweat? Steve may be right about my being a bug magnet.  My parents used to call me “Sweetness” which sounds nice, but I’m beginning to suspect it […]

Beach House Thanksgiving

 in Gratitude  tagged Atlantic / beach / beach combimg / celebrations / family / Thanksgiving / waves by

As I mixed Grandma Marie’s stuffing this morning, I dredged memories of the celebration opus our family built around a Carolina beach house last year.  I wanted a full house for Mom, too long alone with her grief.  We all love her, but the kids are scattered from the Atlantic to the Rockies and ever so busy grappling life’s dragons.  Thanksgiving week on the beach proved an ideal no-refuse-offer. The waves, foamy gray, loomed so high that the sun sometimes shone through, illuminating the living green within.  One monster put three-year old Conner to flight.  His sprint propelled him ten times beyond its reach.  He’d never been to the beach; how was he to know what a wave might […]