Vacations are fabulous but just because you’re getting some rest and relaxation doesn’t mean some harsh truths won’t work their way into your trip.
During one four-hour period last week at a Lake Tahoe beach I experienced the trifecta of how you can never really escape reality.
It all started with my husband mercilessly badgering me to get in a kayak. Finally, I had to remind him of something I preferred to never think about again – the great kayak fiasco of 2013.
This is when I got stuck in a kayak. As in the lower half of my body was being held hostage by a stupid hipster canoe. At one point I thought it was going to take the jaws of life to release me from my kayak bondage.
I finally got free by going back out to deeper water and turning the kayak upside down so I could slither out like an obese eel.
My husband remembered the situation very differently and said it was “no big deal.” Which, I guess is easy for him to say since he wasn’t the one imprisoned in a polyethylene plastic.
To his credit he did manage to talk me into getting back in a kayak . It was a two-seater and had what I called a “free range thigh area.”
I’m sure you’ll be glad to know that this time I was able to make a graceful exit from the kayak. The fact that after disembarking I tripped, fell into the water, and then got my leg wrapped in some webbed kayak rigging thus turning the boat into the world’s most ridiculous swim fin is something I plan to banish from my brain forever.
Next up in the hit parade was an egregious vacation faux pas by my husband. As in he told me that I looked like Paddington Bear. The pudgy, furry, did I mention pudgy, bear from the beloved children’s books.
The fact that this observation was made while I was in a swimsuit upped the WTH? ante. I looked at him and said, “Is this your way of telling me you want a divorce? Because if so, the answer is a yes and how soon.”
This confused him to such an extent that he rubbed his face with both hands and said, “No, no, no, I’m talking about the hat. The hat you have on looks like the one Paddington Bear wears.”
Nice save, I’m thinking. But he still got a whole lot of side-eye from me for the rest of the day.
Still in recovery mode from being compared to a chunky bear I decided to take a dive off a lake pier to clear my head. This pier is about 15 feet high and there’s usually a couple of people standing on the edge deciding if they want to make the leap into the water.
Since I’ve been jumping off this pier for at least 20 years I nonchalantly took the plunge. As I’m going in the water I heard a dad yell at his kid, “C’mon if that old lady did it so can you.”
When I surfaced I looked up at the dad and his son and yelled, “This old lady gives it a thumbs up.”
I then swam for the shore. An aging bear paddling through the water. My only consultation was that I got that kayak off my foot, so I had that going for me. But then I started to laugh. If bounding off piers, wearing goofy hats and boating on Lake Tahoe was the old lady life then consider me 100 percent all in.
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Hang on Snarky friends because I have a lot to tell you. First is that the audiobook for my latest novel EMPTY is out. The narrator Connie Shabshab did a wonderful job and I can’t wait for you to take a listen.
🎧The book is available on Audible, iTunes and Amazon. 👂Click here to give your ears a treat. https://www.audible.com/pd/B0B7QGQXDH/?source_code=AUDFPWS0223189MWT-BK-ACX0-317063&ref=acx_bty_BK_ACX0_317063_rh_us
🥳 Also in celebration of the audiobook being released I have discounted the Kindle price for EMPTY to $4.99 for just a few short days so click here to take advantage of the deal. www.amazon.com/dp/B09ZKPGQZQ
Thank you everyone for being so supportive of my writing and putting up with all my “buy my book” shout outs. I appreciate all of you! ❤️
Oh and one last thing if you’ve read EMPTY I would be beyond delighted if you would write an Amazon review. 😘
Snarky in the Suburbs 