The Ride Home

 On Sunday morning, we finished packing the remainder of the food and gave the place a final cleaning - and then it was time to take off - Jake in his car and the rest of us in mine. We stopped and touched touched base briefly one last time in Sandwich, said final goodbyes, then Jake was off to Boston and we headed for home.

It's usually quiet on the ride home (when I'm not ranting about traffic) and, traffic aside, it kind of becomes a time of reflection. I find myself thinking about the vacation which just ended, as well as many of the ones which came before.

It was kind of comforting to see that some of the places were still the same - the Sundae School and the Pottery Place, for example. And though some places had changed it was still close enough to what it was like 'before'. All part of the evolution, I guess. 'Time marches on', and all of that.

But as I drove on, I slowly began to realize that maybe what changed the most, unfortunately ... was me. 

I thought about the last time we went on vacation and how I didn't pack my bifocals - because back then, I didn't have any. And I though about how I didn't pack my hearing aids, because I didn't have those, either. And I thought about how I didn't pack my CPAP machine...my CPAP machine...my CPAP machine... Crap! I left my CPAP machine back at the cottage!

So, not only am I losing my eyesight and my hearing, apparently I'm also losing my mind (which I guess in the end might be a good thing. Without a mind, maybe losing all the other things won't bother me so much).

(But it all ended well (poor eyesight, etc., aside). I'm happy to report that, after stopping along the way for a bathroom break (due to other people's bladders, not mine...yet), Rachael managed to contact the owner of the Airbnb, who kindly shipped it to my house.) Another happy ending!