dizziness on the beach . . . not quite the same as %$@ on the beach

Clever phrasing is rolling around in my head but, honestly, none of it is authentic Holly today. I am sick. I am so sick of being sick. I woke up on my stomach; pushing my head up made me dizzy. I was immediately on the swaying dock, rocking back and forth under my unsteady body. Tidak bagus, no good. I groaned, knowing it was another day of “get up and do, survive” instead of “get up and enjoy.”

I try very hard to not even talk about it to my family. Mentioning it over and over everyday has become old, mundane, irritating to all of us. Yet just doing the dishes, bent forward over the short, deep Balinese sink, is so extremely uncomfortable I feel that my body is going to fall out from under me. But I do these tasks, knowing I have to pull my weight, keep this trip from being unbearable for everybody. My body drops in to a chair when I’m done, worn out from fighting the dizziness.  Of course I have been in a chair much, much too often in the past few weeks – my feet are now painfully tingling by the early afternoon. I need to be up walking more, swimming more, doing more. I try. I know to the others around me it doesn’t seem like it, but I try. I am just so goddamn tired, every inch of me filled with lead.  I am too tired to fight about it. I am too tired to cry about it. I am too tired to write cleverly about it.

I wonder sometimes what this trip would have looked like if I was healthy. Would I have been brave enough to try driving the motorcycle? Would I have gone on more side trips? Would Auggie enjoy it more, having me in the water with him more, running with him more? I don’t think anything has been bad, or that Auggie has been unhappy – the pace of the days has just been slower than what was sometimes desirable for the boys. Thank god Auggie is at the age that he loves going on adventures with Andre or that he can entertain himself for chunks of time.

Andre’s mom is here now, SusieJo. She is Auggie’s new play toy. She brought quite a few books in preparation of reading and sunbathing – hahahahahahah. Auggie has other plans. Which is good, because sunbathing next to a woman in her sixties who looks amazing in her bikini is hard on my fluffy body’s ego.  Maybe I will hide her swimsuits . . . but then she will just go naked. If you know Susie, you know I’m not lying. Though that would make Auggie happy; they could run down the beach together, naked and free. And I could read my book in peace, covered in a one-piece, frying in the sun.