We decided to take a break from the snow and ice in Roscommon.
My bride and I have just returned from a two-week
Florida/Caribbean vacation. We spent the first week on a cruise ship and the
second week near Ft Lauderdale, and then a few more days at the opposite side of the state at
Naples. It was a treat and the warm weather was a welcome relief from the
foot-deep snow that we had when we left Roscommon in early February.
The occasion of the cruise was 1) to celebrate Marjorie’s
birthday and 2) to enjoy square dancing while cruising. Yes, we did the old
Alamand Left and Grand Right and Left on a cruise ship. There were about 100 of
us square dancers who sashayed across the ocean and around the islands to the
music provided by three very talented national callers. We danced every day on
the ship, sometimes on deck in the cool of the evenings, or below decks during
the daytime with its warmer temperatures. It was fun. Only one dance was a bit
challenging when the ship was rolling about in the wind and the deck wasn’t where
I expected it to be.
The ship that we cruised on was unlike any of our previous voyaging
experiences. This ship, Royal Caribbean’s Oasis
of the Seas, held the title of world’s largest ship until Royal Caribbean
eclipsed their own size record by building two other ships a few feet larger.
The size of the behemoth provided a few challenges: With its 6,700 passengers
and 2,000 plus crew members, finding things and getting around the 16 decks,
numerous dining rooms and an untold number of bars, was a major undertaking.
One lady who waited with me at one of the numerous elevators told me she
wouldn’t ever sail on this ship again. “I’ve been trying to find my room for
the past three days,” she said.
I understood since I had just found my way to the elevator
after a stint in the floating bar. That’s right, a floating tavern; a unique
boat-shaped bar that I climbed aboard at its moorings on the sixth deck. No
sooner had I ordered my beer and the bartender/captain cast us off and the
boat/bar began to rise off the floor. Before I had drunk half my beer, I was
staring over the gunwale some two floors higher, wondering if someone had
slipped a Mickey in my drink. We made it safely back to the sixth deck and I
hustled to our room, sobered by the sensation of apparent weightlessness but
with no other injuries except to my wallet.
I did run into some good luck during the cruise. One
afternoon, as my betrothed and I were finding our way to our room, we stumbled
into the casino. Marjorie remembered that we had been given a $5 coupon for
free play for each of us. We decided to test our luck with the $10. The casino was empty at
that moment and the casino manager welcomed us as he must have wondered about
the two hicks who were completely unfamiliar with all the machines. He helped
us with our free $5 coupons and directed us to a machine to deposit our money
and showed us which buttons to push. We did - push the buttons, that is. It was a two- cent machine. Two
cent wagering-- it boggles the mind. Anyway, I pushed the button a dozen times
or more, watching as the indicator showed my $5 dollars being slowly eaten by
the machine with each push of the button. The pictures whirled, the bells
dinged and another two cents went down the drain. I pushed on, one wager after
another. Then, something different happened! To this day, I don’t know what it
was, but the pictures in the machine suddenly began spinning, whistles blew,
lights flashed, and the indicator showing my money flashed, and then began
adding pennies to my stock of cash, two cents at a time, each time punctuated
with a ding recalling the days when cash registers tallied your purchases. Then
the dings changed pitch and the two cents became 20 cents at each ding. Finally,
the dinger stopped dinging. My cash value was now at $5.26. And then the
machine went quiet. It was as if the machine and I had been in deadly combat
and then the machine gave up, and -- I won.
I turned to Marjorie. “I’m going to cash out,” I said.
Between us, we had parlayed our free $10 to a new combined
total of $8.14. I stuffed the money in my shirt and we hurried out before the
casino manager could object. When we finally found our room, we couldn’t stop
laughing at our good fortune.
The cruise ended too soon and we found ourselves at Marjorie’s
sister’s condominium where we celebrated both her and Marjorie’s birthdays. The
$ 8.14 didn’t go very far, but at least we found our room every night.
We used our rented SUV that was loaded down with our bags
full of dance clothes to travel from her sister's place at Ft. Lauderdale along Alligator Alley to
Naples. I thought we had gone to another country. It seemed as though we had
left the realm of ordinary America and somehow reached a new universe where
everyone was rich. In downtown Naples, we saw only expensive cars; a Bentley
convertible, several Ferrari’s, a few Corvettes and other European sports cars
- most driven by old white guys with unusually dark tans. I was a bit reluctant to shop in Naples since I didn’t think that I
fit in real well, with my white face, cowboy shirt and bolo tie. We stopped at
a coffee shop for a doughnut and $5 coffee, then visited a downtown shop named
Fresh Produce. They didn’t have any. Instead, the store featured women’s
clothing. I sat on the curb outdoors and watched the Bentleys pass by while
Marjorie shopped.
After visiting our friends and mooching off them as long as we dared, we left Naples and its 80 plus degrees for the airport and
the trip back to Detroit. We arrived home to a surprise: Roscommon’s weather
was delightful, with our first sunshine of the entire winter and the snow and ice
mostly gone. Except for my driveway and the road in front of our house, of
course. I murmured aloud about how we couldn’t have everything, and how it felt
real good to be home where the coffee is much lower cost and you don't have to worry about Bentley's being in your way.
