I’m back from my adventure on the high seas and have resumed construction on my cyber pyramid. I’ve condensed my time away into diary form, I can’t account for a day or two…this will just be easier on all of us.
The Pirate’s Code dictates that “what happens on the ship stays on the ship” but I’m willing to mutiny for herstory’s sake.
Friday…Day One: I had set my alarm on my cell phone for 4 a.m. but forgot to take it off of vibrate. I have a back-up alarm clock that runs on AA batteries, which of course, were missing. The only batteries left in my spare battery box belonged to a hearing aid and the smoke alarm. I took the batteries out of the remote control to my daughter’s television. I found out later that she had taken them out of my back-up alarm clock. Neither alarm wakes me up.
4:30 a.m.: I jolt awake. I have to leave my house by 5:30 a.m. I have not packed. I haven’t even gotten my suitcase down from the attic. I like to live on the edge.
I have pull down stairs to my attic in the hallway. The handle is about six inches too high for me to reach, and even though I know I will have to drag a chair from the kitchen to climb on, I still try jumping to grab it.
I climb the ladder and turn on the attic light. I notice that the bag of deadly mouse cuisine that I placed there about a week ago is empty. I’m also pretty certain that there is a furry little carcass stuck to one of the ladder rungs. No time to check it out. It’s pretty cold in the attic…it’ll keep until I get back. I’m behind schedule and I’M ON VACATION. I toss the bag down and let the stairs up with a thud. Nothing falls out, so maybe I was seeing things….
There is a strange wet spot in the bottom of the suitcase and my little mouse friends have been using one of the zipper compartments to store the little blue poison pellets that they are supposed to eat. I’d like to think it’s for later consumption, but I know it to be an “up yours”. I drag the bag outside and dump it out. I empty the Febreeze into the bottom of the suitcase…I’m good to go.
I am seriously behind schedule. No time to pack sensibly…I’ll just open my closet and grab a handful of clothes and some shoes. The only important items that I don’t want to leave behind are my pirate’s costume and wig for wig night. These are essential for a proper Blues Cruise experience.
I check the clock…I need to wash and flat-iron my hair. It will be the last time before we sail, as once my hair hits the ocean air it expands like one of those wonder sponges and goes all tumbleweed.
By the time I drag my suitcase out to the car, I am an hour behind schedule. My Jeep is parked on a hill. I open the back and turn to lift my suitcase. It’s one of those giant duffle type bags with a lot of zippers and straps. It’s almost as tall as I am and it looks like it’s stuffed with a small body. I can’t lift it up high enough to hoist it into the back of the car. I get it about halfway in and it slips back out. If I were a crybaby, now would be the time to turn on the tears. I get the bag under my shoulders and try to lift it up that way. No go. Then it dawns on me to empty some of it…
Success…I’M ON VACATION.
I zipped by and picked up my girlfriend CBS. She is standing by the door. She sees the look on my face and doesn’t say a word. Off we go…we’re ON VACATION.
We decided to fly to Ft. Lauderdale this year. We’ve driven in the past…but the weather and my creek are too unpredictable. One year the weather was bad the day before we left and I had to leave my Jeep parked on the other side of the creek…just in case. My plan was to drive my pick-up out in the event that the water was up in the creek…it sits higher than my Jeep. Great plan…if my truck would have started…
Desperate times call for desperate measures. I put the truck in gear and headed down the hill. It isn’t a stick shift, so there was no possibility of popping the clutch. I just figured if I got enough momentum I could make it over the creek. The plan had a few flaws. It’s not a straight run. I had no power steering and it was pouring rain. I would have made it too, if I hadn’t instinctively put my foot on the brake to avoid the tree at the bottom of the hill.
Turned out, the creek was only six inches deep. My Jeep was sitting stone-faced on the opposite side. I ripped a hole in a garbage bag I found under the seat of the truck and fashioned myself a poncho…pulled up the legs of my jeans and humped my luggage over the creek and was on my way.
A year wiser and a vehicle shorter…we headed to the Nashville Airport. It was a beautiful morning. I dragged my bag up to the check-in. It weighed 63 pounds…13 pounds over the weight limit. What had I packed? Oh well…I paid the extra fifty dollars…no biggie…I’M ON VACATION.
The flight was smooth and quick and we landed in Ft. Lauderdale ahead of schedule. We arrived on Friday. The ship wasn’t sailing until Sunday…two days to relax and get ready to sail…
The hotels near the piers are holding areas for departing cruise ship passengers. They are all hanging out in the pool area. The average age is 60. As we drag our bags past the pool on our way to the room, I have a deja vu…I’ve seen this before…
An old bald guy with a scrawny pony-tail runs in front of me and dives into the pool…oh yeah…now I remember…the pool scene in “Cocoon”…
Uh-oh…now that I think of it…with the exception of the hotel staff, I’ve not seen anyone under the age of forty-five. I am surrounded by ancients…and I am one of them…NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO.
Reality check. It is what it is. It’s too early for cocktails, so CBS and I decide to walk over to the K-Mart shopping center down the street. There we join the rest of the cruise zombies, standing in line to buy last minute items that will never leave our suitcases.
On our way back to the hotel I fall off of my flip-flops and trip over a curb…I try to stop my forward momentum and tumble into a hedge. A car with a young couple slows down. I see her shaking her head. I know she thinks I am just one of those crazy old cruise ship broads, already partying hardy and drunk off my ass in the middle of the K-Mart shopping plaza.
I’ve stubbed my toe and chipped off part of my freshly painted French pedicure…my nail now sits at a jaunty angle and it will drive me crazy for the rest of the week. I put it out of my head…I’M ON VACATION.
When we get back to the hotel, I notice a room off of the pool area with gym equipment in it. For a minute I entertain the idea of working out…like one more good sweat will put me into the bikini without the cover-up….then I see that the gym is actually in the hotel right next door…problem solved…
That night there is a party by the pool. It is being dejayed by a radio announcer who is broadcasting live…the cruisers who are hosting the party are leaving on a fifties cruise the next day…
We’re leaving the day after that on a “blues cruise”…which we think gives us a slightly edgier badge of cool…but we join their pool party anyway…there’s free pizza and a bunch of really fun people dancing wildly…and badly…I fit right in.
We find out that the dancing is being streamed…live…over the internet. There is already enough blackmail footage of my dancing in existence…I decide to call it a night…I don’t want to peak my partying before we even get on our ship….tomorrow is another day…and for some reason I keep thinking about “Rosemary’s Baby”…..
The next morning I head over to run around the K-Mart shopping center again…it is huge and I estimate that if I run around it and head past Home Depot three times it will be about three miles. The guy who is hosing the sidewalk in front of Home Depot smiles and waves…I try to jump over the spray…
Oh well…I can put my sneakers out to dry on our ship verandah tomorrow…
Later that morning CBS and I head over to buy some more things we don’t need. My hair gets tangled in some hangars in Marshall’s and yanks me backwards…three times. I decide to buy a twelve dollar maxi-dress which is seven inches too long for me…because everyone needs one…and my debit card gets rejected…WHHHHAAAAAA…what?!? I have another one…that one gets rejected too. I feel panic setting in…I know I have plenty of money in my accounts. I go outside to call the number on the back of my card. I don’t have my glasses…it takes me a few tries to get the number right…lucky for me the bank chick hears the panic in my voice. Apparently in Florida and parts of California, if you shop in the twelve dollar dress stores and they try to run your debit card as a credit card it will not go through.
Moral…don’t buy twelve dollar dresses unless you are using cash.
The rest of our party arrives later that day…they are all part of a band and will be playing on the ship…they unload their luggage and their instruments and we all meet by the pool with the rest of the ancients…I’m not fighting it anymore…I AM ONE OF THEM.
Sometime in the afternoon we get the brilliant idea to wobble across a six lane highway to get some Mexican food. My girlfriend with the knee replacement is holding my arm so I won’t fall off my flip-flops again in the middle of the road.
Some kind of unnatural selection seems to be going on in Ft. Lauderdale…there are an awful lot of young people driving sports cars who appear to be gunning for the elderly…who, for them, is anyone over forty.
We made it across the six lane highway…and I stayed on my flip-flops, but I know I was in at least two cars’ sight lines…
The day turned into night…we headed over to the kick-off party…everyone looked fresh faced, wide-eyed and excited…we are friends now with many return cruisers. Time to get some rest…for most it will be the last good night’s sleep they’ll get for the next week….
The next morning we join the rest of the line waiters…the place savers…and the perpetually late. It’s time to be bundled off to the cruise ships…
This ride is about to start.
The line of ancients for the ship that is docked next to us is quiet and refined. There are an assortment of Jazzy chairs and canes and the latest in cruise wear.
I look at our line…we are also a collection of ancients, in a bizarro parallel universe…guys with long gray hair and tie-dye shirts…some dragging guitar cases…others…boxes of booze and wine…chicks with tattoos and halter tops…our Jazzy chairs are decorated with beer cupholders and Mardi Gras beads.
Our cruise oozes a classless sophistication that is driven home by the sign we’ve stretched across the back of the ship that screams: Our Ship Kicks Ass!
We are the fun ones…and when our floating boom box pulls into port, all the other ship’s passengers will wish they could stow away on our ride.
The Holland America staff is efficient and gets us boarded quickly. Of course it is probably best they get us off of the pier….
The Legendary Blues Cruise is a floating music party…famous blues peeps come on board to entertain and the passengers who play can bring their instruments and join in jams all around the ship…for an amateur musician it is nirvana…they get to rub elbows with the pros…who can’t get away from the fans…unless they can swim REALLY FAR.
By the end of the week everyone is family…related by blues and booze and lack of snooze.
The ship has barely left the port and the food begins to flow…I have made up my mind that I am spending my week in the gym and AWAY from the bread and fattening food. There is enough fruit and salad to keep me from falling off of the food wagon…I feel strong and thinnish and pledge to stay that way…we are four hours out…so far…so good.
CBS and I are sharing our stateroom with Joe…the drummer for their band. He is shoved into a corner with his belongings…this is girl town and he is overruled. He’s traveled with us before…he knows the ropes.
I unpack my 63 pound suitcase…my grab bag packing style has produced my work out clothes, my wig and pirate outfit, my wishful thinking bikini and more likely Miracle suit, and eight pairs of jeans…one with giant holes in the back pockets and knees and another with a broken zipper. I only packed three shirts. Won’t matter, I’ll fit right in with the peeps who are dressed in the same clothes they arrived in for the entire week. Casual includes just turning your shorts inside out on this trip. Most of the 63 pounds belongs to the assortment of shoes I shoved into the bottom of the bag. I’m certain I won’t be tottering around on my Louboutins, but they deserved a cruise…I tuck them back into the bag and slip on my free fall flip-flops…they will be my shoes of the day unless I’m wearing my sneakers.
I head up to the gym…by the time I finish…I’ve signed us up for the hydro-pool (or “crock-pot” as we fondly call the human oil and boil) and I’m in the indoor cycling class and the boot camp. I did the boot camp the year before. If not being able to sit up quickly or walk straight were results, then I got them. I was excited to see they were offering it again.
First night out and CBS, Marvin, Doc and Joe head up to the Crow’s Nest to play in the jam…Sheila, Phyllis and I are the street team. I take my seat in the cushy chairs near the window. The sun is setting and it is glorious. I sip the drink of the day and don’t even think about the cookie and ice-cream bar on the Lido Deck.
Later, when I pass it on my way to the stairs, I toss my head and laugh. I am not even tempted. It is the end of day one…
My first indoor cycling class goes off without a hitch. The trainer is pretty raucous and it is a really great workout. The sea is pretty calm…which is good because riding a bike inside a rolling ship can be challenging….I have an hour before boot camp so I head into the Lido to eat a healthy egg white omelet WITHOUT bread and some fresh fruit. Look at me…all healthy…with a strut, even…
Boot camp is exactly what I expected it to be…I was drenched. I headed into the crock pot to have a good soak. There are several people on the rack bubbling away…so I try to get inside the ring in the center with the high spray jets…they are strong and I can’t hang onto the rail without getting pitched back out into the pool.
The people on the rack are laying back with their eyes closed…peaceful…
I can’t sit still for long and I realize something about myself…I don’t know how to relax.
Hmmm…when I get back to the room there is a complementary travel can of condoms on each of our beds…unless CBS and I plan to fill them with water and toss them off of our balcony, there is no chance we’ll be cracking them open…I’ve scoped out my only possibility and he was wearing a wristband that said “Fall Risk”…enough said. We toss them over to Joe…he has selective hearing and has tuned us out.
I have a confession…I am not really into blues music…I am, however, into the gym and the spa and the casino. I trot myself down to the casino and decide to play a two cent machine. I put in twenty dollars and a few minutes later I had two hundred…ho ho ho….I lose it ten minutes later…ha ha ha.
Wig night on the ship is ridiculous fun…I have a lavender wild child wig…last year I wore the same one in pink…it was the only time I got any attention or play on the ship…apparently polyester pink hair drives men insane…take note girls. Note to self: the lavender wig does not have the same effect.
CBS has dressed Marvin in a red Wendy wig with pigtails. I draw freckles on him and she paints his lips with 24 hour cherry red gloss. He looks like the horror movie character Chuckie’s sister. Later that night when he is playing his guitar he looks like Bette Davis from “Whatever Happened to Baby Jane”….scary…
Night and day…or day and night…already it doesn’t matter…on a ship with so much booze and so much partying, it is amazing to me that I have never seen any fights…ever.
I sit up too fast the next morning…my abs are not working…I am folded in half…in pain. I warn Joe not to laugh or I will fold him up in the sofa bed…he laughs anyway because he knows I can’t extend my arms far enough to do it. Boot camp has taken a heavy toll…but I put my sneakers on and head off for another day of pain without weight gain…no bread again…I am so proud of me.
Tuesday afternoon we pull into Puerto Rico…I’ve been there before so I don’t go ashore…I am going to attempt to deflate my tumbleweed hairdo and stuff it under a hat…it’s Pirate Night…my favorite night on the ship…not everyone dresses up, but the ones that do pull out all the stops…and I am here to tell you that a good pirate costume (and a Pina Colada) can give almost any guy a Johnny Depp sexiness…yep…look around the next time you’re in a room full of pirates…on a rocking ship…having lost count of your drinks of the day…yo ho ho…I’m just saying…
The next two days we are pulling into ports…St. Croix and St. Marteen…the ship is able to dock so we can come and go as we please. One of the mega-ships pulls in next to us…it looks like the Starship Enterprise…with three large screens and an amphitheater in the rear…I am thinking if they play a movie we will be able to watch it like we’re at a drive-in…that’s how huge it is…
I wanted to take a biking tour on one of the islands, but there are some time changes when you’re at sea…and I overslept…and that’s the story I’m going with…
It’s dessert night and the feature is everything chocolate…I consider going off of my “diet” and decide that now might be the time…it isn’t until 11:30 that night and I put in a wake-up call in case I fall asleep….around 12:45 I wander down and choose a chocolate covered candy apple. I can tell you straight up that I kicked myself the next day for not having cake…followed by cake with a little cake on the side.
And that is how I fell off of the food wagon and into the sea of salty and sweet and all that is bread.
Two more days of indoor cycling and boot camp might delay a little damage, but not undo the breadfest that I participated in for the remainder of the trip.
Like a locust, I cut a swarth through the crusty rolls in the bread basket…sans butter…like that would make a difference…
I followed that up with the box of Belgium chocolates that I bought for my friend Pat back at home…she wouldn’t have liked them…I did her a favor and took the fall.
I must have fallen asleep with one in my hand…I found it melted there and licked it off quietly…like a chocolate junkie…
Our roomie Joe had been stumbling in about an hour before daylight every morning…this morning he came in, laid down, got back up and left…when he came back to the room, he was only wearing shorts and he was soaking wet. We still haven’t figured that one out…some things should just stay unexplained…
CBS stalked Shamekia Copeland and asked her to come up to the Crow’s Nest to hear the band sing one of her songs…I have known CBS for a long time…her jaw dropped when Shamekia showed up and she was silent for a full sixty seconds, which is a record for her….after she sang, she sat with Shamekia and chatted…I took their pic…between you and me…CBS could have jumped overboard and gone home….that visit by Shamekia made her week…and fyi…she rocked Shamekia’s song too….
We left the ship the way we came…a rag-tag bunch of middle-aged people who refuse to give-in to age and just stay away from mirrors…rocking and rolling and singing the blues…dancing the night away…and most of the day too…
Day three hundred and thirty seven through three hundred and twenty seven…
We are family….
Cynthia Neilson