It Is Breath to My Soul

It's almost that time again.

My home away from home...

Marco Island, Florida.

I've been waiting since winter -- no, even before --

counting down the days till our vacation,

planning (hoping) to have all three sons with us this year

to celebrate the Fourth of July for the first time ever

on Marco Island.

We switched our vacation to July this year,

which means we missed seeing our
"other families"

who we normally vacation with in June at Marco.

(Next year we'll be with them again...and it's in pen, a done deal!)

We've not had all our sons there together

for about four -- maybe five? -- years,

and I've been squirming with excitement.

Zach, our oldest, confirmed in May

that he would be able to fly in from Japan to join us,

which we'd been hoping would work out.

The letdown?

Ouch.  Unfortunately, we learned last week

that our middle son Gavin

would not be able to take off from work after all 

for that week, the owner needing that week off for a family event.

And the owner trumps.

I was beyond disappointed.

My emotions took a toll ...

I wallowed.

Consumed.

Pathetically. 

I refused to even talk about it.

It took me over a week to come to terms 

with my disappointment.

I think what made it worse was that I haven't

been able to see Gavin since March 

due to his crazy work schedule not getting weekends off.  

They've been training new managers,

and he's been slammed with his schedule.

Hopefully things will ease up sometime in July.

I want to make the most of this vacation

despite my high hopes of the five of us being together

having been splintered.

I will not let this rob me of the joy of

Zach and Colton getting to spend time together at least

after almost a year of not seeing each other...

AND...we'll be celebrating the Fourth of July together...

in paradise!

We're making memories.

We're leaving our worries behind.

It's time to unplug and purge.

Just over a week to go...

I.CAN'T.WAIT.