Is a Change as good as a Rest?

“There is nothing like staying at home for real comfort”

– Jane Austen

The summer is over.  Winter is definitely on its way.  People are wearing heavier coats, I haven't seen a flip flop in a few weeks, and Brown Thomas has opened their Christmas shop.  Apparently.  I wouldn't know.  To be honest, I don't tend to frequent the hallowed halls of Brown Thomas.  I find it a bit intimidating.  I can't afford anything in there so I just walk around, looking like an extremely well fed Little Match Girl among the fragrant women with their personal shoppers. 

His Nibs and I went out on Saturday, to Tipperary.  There's a lovely place there, with guest rooms and a fabulous restaurant.  About once a year His Nibs and I like to go for a gorgeous dinner, and maybe a drink, and a night away from the noisy hounds we usually share our lives with.  It's the perfect place for dinner.  It’s nice enough to wear your makeup, but because of the cobbled courtyard only a fool would wear her heels.  It suits me very well.

And that was our holidays for the year.  One night, in Tipperary.  We were delighted with ourselves.  For here is our confession.
We don't want to go on our holidays abroad anymore.

There's an exception of course.  I'd love to go and see my family in Chicago.  But if they lived on the moon I'd want to go there.  That's about my family, not the travelling.  In fact, I consider the fact that they are so far away as the price I must pay for seeing them.

I'm gone right off travelling.  The endless work and panicking and stress.  So has His Nibs.

In fact, for the first time ever, neither of us even has a valid passport. 

First of all there's the awful visit to the waxing salon to get assaulted by a stranger in preparation for going out in public in a swimsuit, of all things.  Then there’s the trip to the shops, trawling around looking for holiday clothes, in a large size.  There is no wraparound skirt or flip flops that can make a woman my size look like a lithe sun goddess.  I spend hours in dressing rooms, sweaty and panting, trying to get into capri pants or even worse, swimwear, miserable and furious.

Then there's the stupid packing.  I hate packing.  I leave it to the last minute in the hope that the pressure of time will give me the gift of packing a capsule wardrobe into a suitcase without roaring and shouting and digging through the laundry basket and threatening His Nibs.  And then I tip it all out and declare that I haven't a stitch that I'm not ashamed of (which is true) and that based on my wardrobe I'm not going on holidays (which is not).

I don’t understand people who love the airport.  From the minute we start arguing about the directions to the long term car park, the long queue to check in, me wandering into shops and him trying to drag me out of them.  We're usually fit to kill each other by the time we get on the plane.  And obviously getting on the plane invariably happens at about five in the pigging morning.

I'm not mad about the plane either, to be honest.  It's too squashy and boring and His Nibs won't stop talking to me, usually on the topic of "Great Air Crashes I have read about" and stopping me from going to sleep.

We always have a row waiting for the luggage.  His Nibs declares that it's all taking too long, he needs a cigarette, he'll go on without me, since it's my luggage we're waiting for.  (He could leave home for good with nothing more than a small rucksack.)   I swear that if he moves a muscle without me by his side I will go straight to the ticket desk and get a flight back home again.  While this foolishness is going on, we are surrounded by other couples and families having the same row.  And everyone has the same expression on their face.  The one that says "Christ almighty, how am I supposed to put up with this eejit for two weeks?"

It seems to take forever to get to wherever we’re staying.  And let’s face facts, it’s always a disappointment.  You might open the door and declare that it’s perfect, and it’s quaint or lovely or ideal for your needs.  But isn’t some part of you thinking “For God’s sake, I can’t even close the door without having to move the table”?

It’s a long time since we’ve been on a sun holiday, but I’ve never stayed in an “apartment” that’s as big as my kitchen at home.  It’s all very well when you first arrive.  The sun is shining and you think you’ll never be in the room anyway, and it doesn’t matter.  But it does matter. I try to completely ignore the sense of impending doom I get when I open my suitcase and realise that the contents are so extensive that they could easily cover the floor of this room twice over.  And that the wardrobe is the size of my knicker drawer at home, and there’s only two hangers, so that even if I make the effort to be tidy and keep things in order, it’s a project doomed to failure. And we’ll definitely have a row at some stage when he kicks a mascara off the balcony, or steps on the plug of my hair straightener and hobbles himself.

All this used to be worth it, years ago, when I could think of no better way to spend two weeks than lying by a swimming pool, gently barbecuing myself, before getting gussied up for a night on the town every night.

I’m afraid we’re gone too old and grumpy for those pursuits.  It's grand for a few days, but we get fed up of it.  I spend longer, these days, getting ready for sunbathing, than I do enjoying it.  It takes ages to find my sunglasses, and choose a book, and put on my sunblock, and find a sun lounger far away from where other people’s children are cannon balling into the pool and incessantly splashing the sunbathers.

And when I finally do achieve the dream, and get the right spot, and lie down, and take out my book before realising the sun is too bright to read, I get bored in less than five minutes.

“What am I doing?” I wonder to myself.  “It’s half past ten in the morning, and I’m lying here, roasting, wearing cream to stop myself from getting a serious burn, wishing I was wearing a burka instead of this stupid skimpy yoke.  If I was at home, sure, it’d be cold, but I’d be in my own bed, in my own house, wearing what I like, His Nibs would make me coffee whenever I want it, if I decided to get out of the bed, there’s no chance a stranger would jump into it, not like this fecking uncomfortable sun lounger.”

It's not that I don’t like sunshine and nice weather.  But I’m happy with Irish sunshine and nice weather, such as it is.  Or moaning about the lack of it.

Then, when it gets to lunchtime,  I start moaning again.  “Feck it, I was out last night.  A ham sandwich would do me grand.  I don’t want more chips.  But sure if I start trying to cook something in that little room I’ll set fire to the place.  All my books are piled up on the hob.  There wasn’t room for them anywhere else.  God, I’m roasting.  Maybe I’ll go shopping.  No, I won’t.  All the shops have the same souvenirs, and all I want is a new mascara to replace the one His Nibs kicked off the balcony.  If I was at home I’d just go to Boots.”

His Nibs isn’t usually party to all this.  He’ll have headed for the hills, literally.  He can’t bear to lie by a pool, he’d rather go to work.  He’ll have taken off on a walk in the early hours of the morning, and will be up a distant hill.  And just as the sun gets to its highest point he’ll realise that his scalp is burning and he’s dehydrated, and it’ll take ages to walk back.  He’s like a nettle by the time he gets back to our little shoebox.

We’ve given it all up.  Feck it.  We’re as well off in our own house, giving out about the weather, but not actually minding.  And he can go out and do his gardening and I’ll be inside reading my books and making up stories.  When we get hungry we’ll at least have a choice of whether to go out or not.  And if His Nibs gets all antsy and bored I’ll just hitch up three dogs and send them all off on a walk, and maybe take an afternoon nap for myself.