I want to go back there.…

I have some pic­tures of my cruise on my desk­top at work and I was look­ing at one tonight, one of my favorites.

Its a pho­to I took from the star­board side of the ship, on deck 5, prom­e­nade, right out­side of the rotun­da lounge while we were hang­ing out, wait­ing for din­ner to start and try­ing to catch the sunset.

I am sit­ting on a bench, and Amy is at the rail­ing look­ing over the side at the water. She just could­n’t get over how blue the water was.

The sun is not direct­ly above us, but it has­n’t set yet and you can see the blue sky and the blue water and the light from the sun off the horizon.

Look­ing at this pho­to made me start to rec­ol­lect about the trip and I cam to a realization.

While we had a long trip (a few days in Mia­mi, the cruise and a few days in Mia­mi after­wards), I took it for granted.

It seemed at the time like the vaca­tion was a nice long one, but look­ing back, it was real­ly short. I took for grant­ed things on the cruise and off shore.

For instance, we nev­er did expe­ri­ence the Point After Dis­co Lounge, the Star Bar, the Piano lounge/bar, the casino…nor did we see all the shows, or try all the dif­fer­ent activ­i­ties. “We always had tomor­row” (Oh the voice of pro­cras­ti­na­tion, I know thee well)

I slept in our room a lot (cou­ple hours each day), I’m sure my acci­dent the week­end before had some­thing to do with that, but still.

And we real­ly did­n’t explore Key West or Cozumel very much. We nev­er made it to an actu­al beach (not in Mia­mi either) nor swam in the ocean, some­thing Amy and I real­ly, real­ly want­ed to do…

Look­ing at this pho­to makes me want to go back, or try anoth­er cruise. I feel a long­ing to be on that water again, feel the slight sway back and forth, and yes, hav­ing food and drinks 24/7.

But even though I missed all that. You know what was prob­a­bly my favorite part about the whole trip. The moment I cher­ish the most and real­ly want to go back and do again?

Amy and I lay­ing out on the SPA deck while the whole ship was still enjoy­ing Key West, with no one else real­ly around us, as near the front of the ship as we could get, just relax­ing togeth­er and talking…and not talk­ing. Doz­ing a lit­tle, a drink near us. Even when it start­ed to sprin­kle, we just lounged their togeth­er and just enjoyed each oth­ers company.

That is what I loved the most.

We were able to do that a few more times (on a fake beach in Cozumel, no, not a real beach, just a walled off sec­tion and high up from actu­al water in the port area) and lat­er that same night while the ship was in Cozumel port wait­ing for a band to start the fiesta.

Those moments togeth­er, just her and I, no oth­er inter­rup­tions. Some­times talk­ing, some­times just say­ing noth­ing at all.

I want more moments like that. I want to find oppor­tu­ni­ties to cre­ate those moments here.

I love you kit­ten, if your read­ing this, thank you for being there with me. Like the song says, “You Say it Best, When you say noth­ing at all”

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Ya know, look­ing at what I just wrote, I real­ized why those moments are so spe­cial to me. It reminds me of Amy and I, when we first met, those first few years. Every night when we went to bed, we would just lay there and talk. Recap our day, plan for the week, or just lay there togeth­er and lis­ten to each oth­er breathe. With my sched­ule now, we don’t get to do that any­more. I feel our bed­room is like a timeshare…I come home and basi­cal­ly kick her out of bed… Per­haps that is what I miss the most, and why those moments on the cruise meant so much to me. It remind­ed me of our younger days and how we had so much time for each oth­er and now, well, school, work, kids, oblig­a­tions seem to eat all that time togeth­er up… Maybe its time to take stock of our lives…