Jamaican Me Crazy

On Wednesday of this week, my family and I are going to Jamaica, to the Beaches Resort in Negril. My brother in law is getting married there (or more aptly, at the adjacent Sandals Resort, which does not allow kids), and we are attending. Everyone in the family is in the wedding, except for myself and Alice. I get to see my husband in a tux, which will be a little bit o' awesome (especially since the tux features a BIG, green satin bow tie, and when he tried it on, I had to bite my tongue to keep from yelling, "And now the Guv-nah from the great state of South Carolina!"). My husband hasn't worn a tux since my junior prom. Also wearing a tux: my son, Sam, who looks appropriately miserable in it, but having served as a ring bearer before is more comfortable and more...let's say tactful about his lot in life than Matt is. AWESOME SAUCE.

Going to an all-inclusive resort of this kind is not something I think I ever would have done, had I not been invited, or needed a reason to get the hell out of Virginia in January which is, let's face it, a really sorry ass time to live in Virginia. For instance, when Matt told me about the wedding, my first response was, "Wait...they're getting married at the place where Michael Scott took Jan that time? Holy shit." That was my only frame of reference because I had never considered doing this kind of thing. I'm more of a "Let's fly to Edinburgh with really no plan at all, and just experience the country!" kinda girl. We are the people, after all, who turned a little four day trip across the country into a 10 day event just because we decided we wanted to go to Tombstone, Arizona. And when family vacation is involved, we're the educational parents, the ones waking our kids up at 7 to go to museums and eating at local food dives we find on the internet. For instance, my husband is planning a trip in 3 years (yes, we look out that far when it comes to travel) to Europe and he wants to spend half a day showing our kids the historic Parisian sewer system because an old professor told him that was "fun". OUR KIDS LOVE US.

People keep asking me if I am excited, and I guess I am. I am excited to start drinking all the watered down drinks some guy who made two whole dollars last year can shove down my throat. I am excited not to be at work, and to get to see my kids during the hours of 8 and 5. I am excited to go out to dinner with my husband, with whom I will have been with for 14 years on Wednesday and who shares my love for making really bad Jamaica jokes that end with the word "mon". I am excited to wear the new shoes I ordered from Lands End Canvas last week. But as far as being super excited about the trip, I'm not.

I've struggled with that a bit, and I've come to the conclusion that I am just a curmudgeonly old woman. And I wonder a lot about this, if I'm so different from other people my age around the country (PLEASE SAY I'M NOT--I DON'T WANT TO BE ALONE ON THE ISLAND OF UNDERWHELMED). I see people who get so excited about stuff--going to Disney World seems to be a popular one, or eating bacon--and I feel pretty disconnected. Sure, I get inordinately happy about things--the start of baseball season, for instance, or 40% sales at J.Crew (HELLO, JARDIN SKIRT)--but I don't get wildly, haphazardly excited about stuff anymore. I am pretty neutral all the time. And I'm not medicated, if that's what you are thinking. For better or worse.

I wonder when I left all that behind, when I became this way. I also wonder if it is not necessarily a bad thing. Like I said, I am pretty neutral, so just as I am not excitable all the time, I'm not oscillating into wild, self-flagellating depression either. YEA. Here's to not locking myself in a room to listen to Nirvana's Unplugged album for a day, while I write really bad poetry, weep, and try to "feel!"

And since this a Debby Downer post in a way, I'll just declare a short intermission say this: BALLS.

Yeah.

You think about balls and try not to be happy. Doesn't matter what kind of balls are bouncing through your mind right now (and I think we all know what kind are floating through mine), you're smiling.

BACK TO YOUR REGULARLY SCHEDULED ENNUI AND SELF REVELATION.

Shockingly, I feel the same way about Pinterest, I have come to find out. When Pinterest first started, I really liked it. I am the type of girl who sits at the computer with a legal pad beside of me, where I write down things I see that I like, be they recipes or dresses or whatever. Here was an online board where I could keep all those things together. And the pictures are pretty. SCORE. But now, when I look at it, I realize that what Pinterest is really used for is just porn for girls who don't like porn. It's is furniture porn, food porn, BOOT porn (which I'm pretty guilty of myself). It is "Here's a brownie, with a layer of fucking cookie dough on top of that and then because I really, really hate my arteries, the little fuckers, I'm going to pour hot fudge on top of that and call it a recipe. BOO YAH." It is someone's dream world, set to pictures, and given a jar of Nutella. But it ain't my dream world, really. Since I am old, and crochetty and given to melancholy and black coffee, I look at that stuff, and I file it away in "No one really makes that," or "That would kill you," or "How to turn a kid into a sociopath in 5 easy steps!" or "IN THIS ECONOMY?!?!" I keep going there, thinking it will change, but it doesn't, and my pins are halfhearted, and I just know you can tell. So really, what I'm saying is, I suck at Pinterest.

And at going on vacation.

Sorry.

Did the internet do this to me? Divorced parents? Being an only child? Television?

Let's go with the internet. Thanks, Al Gore.