Our Trip To The Washington Coast: DAY 3 "RELAX, (For Pete’s Sake)You’re On Vacation"

I guess the fire alarm went off in our hotel last night. We didn’t hear it. When I heard people talking about it at breakfast, I had images flash through my mind of me, grabbing my kids and luggage, and running like a mad-woman through the hall in my jammies, only to find it was a false alarm. I was grateful we couldn’t hear it. Then, I thought, ‘I sure hope there isn’t a real fire… or we are toast.’

After breakfast, we walked along the beach, and kicked around in the waves. It was fun. I think everyone should see the ocean at some point in their life. I remember vividly, the first time I saw the ocean. I love the ocean’s beauty. I love it’s sounds, and the breeze, and the entire atmosphere-- but the pure power of it is scary to me. I don’t like it’s enormity. I don’t like its unpredictability. So, while it was fun to see my children’s excitement, it was also stressful for me to have them so close to it.





We spent part of the day in Aberdeen. Ryan went to the funeral home to help dress his grandpa’s body. I think that experience was both special, and emotionally disturbing to him. We went to wal-mart (an experience that wasn’t special, but was emotionally disturbing to me… YIKES!-- I’ll just say it was like a walk-through virtual tour of peopleofwalmart.com).
We had dinner on the beach. This is where I had to keep reminding myself to breathe, and let my children experience life, without their paranoid Mother squelching on it. We had HOTDOGS (side note #1: I get nervous when my kids eat hotdogs, because I worry they will choke on them. I think this fear comes from watching my Mother perform the Heimlich on ALL of my siblings, a couple of my children, as well as myself. I choked on a hotdog.) We roasted them over an open FIRE (side note # 2: I get nervous when my children are around fire, especially one child in particular who seems to fall down constantly). There were a few BIG DOGS around (side note #3: I have had an irrational fear of big dogs ever since one tried to bite my face off when I was little. I also witnessed a big dog try to bite my friends face off while I was in High School. I had to take her to the emergency room. Dogs are unpredictable… and I don’t like unpredictable). The wind was blowing on my newborn, and taking his breathe away which was giving him a fit, so I had to sit in the van for most of the time. I watched my children playing by the OCEAN (I already explained my feelings on the big bad powerful ocean). I felt like in the van I couldn’t “control” the “danger zone” we were in-- this gave me anxiety. So… while my ENTIRE family loved having dinner on the beach (and made a great memory) I had a hard time fully appreciating it.