Of Commitment and Hot Pink Beach Chairs
ByHusband and I went on vacation last week. To our usual spot – The Outerbanks in North Carolina. The NC coast offers some of the most spectacular beaches, wide and white, from which you can gaze endlessly at rolling waves, occasional dolphins, and, of course, the famous Spanish wild ponies (when they decide to make an appearance – living legends cannot be just summoned).
For one week, we laid claim to a ridiculously large house, one that could easily house several families. But, it’s like that every year. It’s not because we feel the need for a different bedroom every night, it’s just that large homes are what’s for rent on the shores of NC. And, we’ve “done” the squeeze-several-families-into-a–beach-house vacation before. Six nights of sleep deprivation, wildly enthusiastic children, and who-took-the-last-beer? comments were enough for us during our one-time try at co-beaching it. Now, we go by ourselves. It just suits us.
So, we packed our usual supplies – beach umbrellas, enough sunscreen to shield Africa, case of favorite wine, cooler, cameras, DVDs and books, and beach chairs, and headed South.
My beach chair, in particular, is an iconic part of my vacation. With me since college, it has been to dozens of beaches, pool sides and even the occasional horse field at my mother’s farm when star gazing was in order on hot August nights. You could say, it’s been around. The white film that coats the aluminum is peeling. The strap used to sling it over a shoulder for easier carrying is long gone. And, the arm is broken and flops around. But, the hot pink synthetic weave still holds tight and it has never collapsed (not a small feat given my on-again, off-again battles of the butt).
My chair is not light. But, it’s not any heavier than any of the other chairs we try out every time we visit a beach supply store. In fact, trying out new beach chairs is a kind of hobby on the first day of every vacation.
First, we assess the variations. Then, we look at the price. $45 for a beach chair, we wonder? Hmmm. Then, it gets lifted up for its weight and we try to remember if it’s lighter than my current chair. Hard to tell. Then, of course, we wonder how long the new chair will last. Longer than our current one? (Is that even possible at this point?)
I am not averse to new. (You just have to peek into my closet at home and understand this.) But, inevitably, we walk out of every store empty handed.
At the close our week, every year, Husband gently suggests we “donate” my chair to the beach house we’ve rented (read: leave it behind). It’s time for a new one, he’d say. Each year, I consider it. But, somehow we end up hauling it back home.
Though an inanimate object, I can’t help but wonder if my chair realizes the commitment I have made to it all these years, so it is just not going to be the first to break it off. Holding itself intact, it will not be the one to give me an excuse to get rid of it and move on. So, a new chair just seems extravagant – and, honestly, a bit like cheating on an old friend — at this point.
So, this year, I said, As long as you have me, you will be packing this beach chair on our vacations. Until it dies, or I do.
We all get attached to things throughout our life, and fall in love with some of the silliest things. But, isn’t it better to be committed –even to hot pink beach chairs?
1 Comments
June 17th, 2009 at 8:50 pm
OhmyGodyes! I never thought of it that way but I have some of those relationships as well…as in the rainbow comforter that was on Chrissy’s (read Christine now) bed when she was small, a coffee cup crazed by years of hot stuff and that tie-die dress that only recently became my favorite dust rag.