Holiday Hangover
By Sean McVeigh
No, I am not talking about next Sunday morning.
Last week, the ol’ ball and chain and I decided to take a page out of everyone else in Rockaway’s book and left town. We were treating ourselves to a delayed honeymoon and flew off to a tropical paradise.
We woke up in the wee hours of Saturday morning and were face to face with more snow than I had seen in years … literally. The meteorologists seemed to nail the last snowfall we had — schools were canceled a day earlier, the salters and plows were out and about all night — but this one seemed to take them, and consequently us, by surprise. Good thing there weren’t that many people planning to travel that day, it being the first day of winter break and all … Another W for the trusted weather service! After sledding to JFK, it appeared the airports were, for the most part, ready for this storm and after a slight de-icing delay, it was clear we were going to make it out. As soon as the wheels left the ground, there was a symphony of “so long suckers!” from seats 13C and 13D ringing throughout the cabin.
It was an amazing week. There is just something about a drink hand-delivered to you while lounging on a beach. And no, the nutcracker guy is not the same thing. Do you know how I know it was a great vacation? I have nothing to share. I went into this trip thinking I would have a list of gripes a mile long to mention in this column. I was leaving Rockaway and getting on a plane, after all! But I have nothing. It was truly a great and relaxing trip. That was just fantasy land, however. I was soon back in the real world and the real world is a mean b***h and she will not soon have you forget it.
I don’t think I have ever returned from a vacation not feeling like I really needed a vacation. Even this one, where everything that could go right went right. Allow me to put on my extreme cynicism hat for a minute and say that vacations, most of the time, are not worth the headache that awaits when you get home.
Without fail, you are going to come home to a messy house. I want to be that clean freak, but it is just not in my blood. Preparing to take a vacation usually involves digging to the back of the closet for that Hawaiian shirt that can only be worn unironically in a tropical place, and in the process, you have scattered the rest of your closet’s contents around the entire house. This goes for that mini, TSA approved toothpaste container and your bathroom, too. And sifting through the post vacation inbox is like trying to find that wedding ring that fell off in the ocean (OK, maybe there were a few things that happened that I could write about in the future).
The worst, however, is the laundry. Maybe some of you overachievers are different, but when I am packing, the only clothes that I am worried about being clean are the ones I need on my trip. When you get home, that means there is a full laundry basket to go along with your suitcase which has been doing its best hamper impression since the first night of the trip. It’s the laundro-pocalypse just as John described in Revelation.
Most trips, especially this time of year, serve as a tease. You step out of the airport to get an Uber and are met with the familiar New York whipping winter wind. Six hours ago, I was sipping a piña colada on the beach, and you think to yourself, how is this possible? But don’t worry, your ride is here. You just need to figure out how to get to Terminal 7 and find a place labeled E3 — I’m sure it will be a cinch.
And just like that, you need a vacation again. The vicious cycle continues.
