Welcome to the Beach
After that stint at summer school, I threw the girls in the Suburban (oh yeah, and two of their friends) and headed south to the beach house. "Pack some crap!" was my battle cry and "Get in the car. You can sleep when you're dead!" We've been suffering through an enormous drought, and the thought of sandy beaches, the Atlantic Ocean and, at least, my Dad's pool, made me delirious.
The trip was uneventful. Sleeping girls. Ipod playing, me driving down I-16 toward I-95. As I headed toward Brunswick, however, I began to notice cars coming toward me with their lights on. Not something too unusual, as I often drive with my own lights on - my warning to get out of my way, I'm coming through. As I examined the horizon, though, I saw dark, ominous clouds, bolts of lightning - typical summer storm stuff. I called my sister to make sure that I wasn't heading into a tornado situation - and she assured me that weather.com said scattered thunderstorms - some severe. Fine, I thought.
Forty-five minutes later, as I pulled off the freeway for the third time, visibility zero, hail battering us and lightning striking much closer than I prefered, I called her back to make sure she had checked for the correct Brunswick/Jacksonville.
We limped into the beach. The three teenagers in the back had stopped making driving comments. They had stopped talking altogether. Nothing like an act of God to get them to settle down. Wake up and shut up.
Yesterday started off a little gloomy but as the day progressed the gloom lifted and it turned out to be beautiful. Right now, it is overcast and sprinkling. I have already walked a mile in it. It thunderstormed last night as I was going to sleep.
Weather.com says that it is supposed to thunderstorm all day. Great. Trapped in the house with four girls, my father and his ladyfriend all day because of thunderstorms. It hasn't rained here in fifteen years and the week I come to the beach, it decides it is going to rain. WTH? There are only so many games I can play and books I can read and cooking shows I can watch when I know the beach is about 45 feet from the house.
I guess a wise traveler would have checked the forecast before throwing everyone in the car. However, a bad day at the beach...
posted by teachergirl at 8:24 AM
1 Comments:
I hope the teens have plenty of electronic entertainment items, a stack of cheesy beach novels and some DVDs.
I spent four days like that once. My parents (who are nuttier than my in-laws), my brother (he's 41 and hasn't found himself yet), his completely bitchy wife, their daughter (bless her heart), the ill-begotten son from hell, my aunt and uncle, my maiden aunt, my husband and our three screaming kids. I still have a nervous twitch and it's been two years.
As you say, though, a bad day at the beach beats a bad day anywhere else. Here's to survival. I hear it tastes great on the rocks with a twist.
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