If you're wondering if I spend too much time planning and not enough time living in the moment, you have a reasonable concern. However, I don't think that the ability and tendency to plan (for the short-term, long-term, and unforeseen) is necessarily exclusive of the ability to live in the moment. The moment I'm living in now is fine enough; I'm eating pizza crusts at the kitchen table, listening to the dueling sounds of a running dishwasher that sounds as if it has trapped a mouse (squeak squeak) and New Orleans jazz on the radio (public radio, of course). The house is a bit on the cool side but not quite cold enough to justify turning on the heat for the first time this year or even flipping the switch on the gas fireplace.
If you think this moment is sounding peaceful and a tad on the dull side, I'm not offended because that's exactly the point I'm trying to make. Living in the moment is great, but what if not much is going on in the moment and you can make it more exciting by working toward creating better moments for the future?
I have convinced myself. It's easy to win an argument when there's no one to offer a counter argument. But let's get back to my favorite topic, vacation.
I had been feeling a tad distraught lately because no city's siren call was loud enough to catch my attention. "Where, oh where will we go for our next vacation?" I shouted out my window into the darkness each night. Well, perhaps it wasn't as dramatic as that, but there might have been a little moping and the occasional, "I don't know where I want to go on vacation next!" whine to B, who takes a much more laid-back approach to travel and doesn't understand the agony that such a situation brings to me. It's ok. He falls a whole lot closer to "Normal" than I do on this scale.
Jackson Hole has not fallen off my radar. However, B told me recently that the summer months could be difficult for travel because of work so we might have to go away in the spring. Jackson would be cold but doable in March or April, but the nearby national parks would likely be difficult to visit due to road closures from snow and/or melt. Summer and fall are much better months for that area. So Jackson is not off the list but it's probably not going to be the next destination, not if we want to go away in March or April.
I decided to try the old sit-back-and-wait approach. We weren't going to book anything until after we got back from PR anyway, so why torture myself with the once-daily flight check (has it gone up?? has it gone down??) until we're actually ready to buy flights?
My strategy paid off. A city has popped into my head and won't go away. I saw a little of the city when So You Think You Can Dance visited last week (or rather, aired the episode last week from when they visited this past summer) and thought it looked nice but didn't think any more of it.
Until earlier this week, that is, when I thought, "What would be a good place to go for a long weekend?" And there it was--New Orleans--strutting through my head with cajun music, wrought iron, Mardi Gras beads, jazz brunches, and beignets.
I broached the subject with B, who was interested, so I visited the local B&N to pick up a guidebook. Pickins were slim but I found an acceptable guidebook that I have since read cover to cover, growing more and more excited by the page. Similar to PR, New Orleans feels like another country, from its architecture to food to music to language/accents. However, just like PR, it isn't another country, so you can pay with the dollar (a nice perk; the dollar is weak weak weeeeeak these days) and get there in a reasonable amount of time (flying, of course).
The trip has grown from a long weekend to a five- or six-night adventure, in my mind anyway. I haven't booked anything so I can make all of the plans that I want to. But there are so many activities that I think we could easily fill five or six days. Here are a few good options that I've found so far:
- Visiting the zoo.
- Taking a ride on the Natchez riverboat.
- Taking a Katrina tour.
- Riding the streetcar (named Desire?) through the Garden District. Brangelina sighting optional.
- Kicking it in the French Quarter.
- Taking a boat ride through a swamp.
- Visiting a plantation.
- Listening to live jazz, cajun, and zydeco music.
- Eating beignets, muffaletta sandwiches, po'boys, and other quintessential Nola foods (though I must confess, I am a little concerned that seafood plays such a significant role in the diet - I will have to stock up on Larabars if we go).
- Shouting "Stella!" at random balconies while clutching my head. Overdone, perhaps, but amusing to me.
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