Don’t dream it’s over (week 15)

As our time in South Carolina draws to a close and our grand #2021LemonadeTour with the girls enters its final days, I’ve started to think of things in terms of “lasts.” As in, our last beach house. Our last grocery run to Publix. Our last dinners with Zac and Tammy. It’s that sort-of sad, sinking feeling one gets when watching a beautiful sunset, and you realize the colors are past their peak. Everything is sloowwwlllyyy getting dimmer and darker. Until, before you know it, the sky is almost black…then completely dark.

I’m not ready for completely dark.

As I’ve mentioned before, the girls fly back to the Midwest on Saturday, but Tony and I still have a few stops to make as we drive our van back to De Pere. That’s probably the only reason why my heart is not breaking into pieces right now. This trip has meant so much to me—not just in terms of the adventures we’ve had and the cool things we’ve seen, but on a deeper level of who I want to be and how I want to live my life.

The family agrees I’m much more relaxed here than I was at home. So while my inclination is to start calling friends and setting up lunch dates and appointments, I’m forcing myself to not immediately fill up my calendar. Of course we want to see all of you—our dear friends and family whom we’ve missed while we’ve been gone! I hope you’ll understand if we set a slow pace for re-entering our “normal” lives.

Retracing our steps: It’s been a relaxed week but far from lazy. When our sunset dolphin cruise on Alayna’s birthday was canceled due to high winds (SUCH a bummer!) we scrambled for a Plan B, which included a hilarious stop at a virtual reality arcade and a second minigolf course. The birthday girl got a hole in one! Her celebratory dinner at one of the top Italian restaurants on Hilton Head left us all in a carb coma; pretty sure her chocolate souffle was a birthday dream come true.

After we left Hilton Head on Friday morning, Tony and I took the girls back to Charleston and the one tourist stop—the Old Exchange & Provost Dungeon—that we hadn’t yet crossed off the list. Definitely worth a visit for the dungeon tour alone! We agreed that it felt good to be back in the Holy City, where the ghost stories and history felt almost as familiar as our favorite parking structure—the one with the free public restrooms! (Ah, travel. So glamorous.)

Friday night, we met up with Zac and Tammy for an enormous seafood feast; later that night, we finally got to meet Tammy’s mom, as she flew in on a late flight from Seattle. It was a bit of a challenge to find an open restaurant near our hotel, but we managed to locate some Mexican food and margaritas. The next morning brought our crew back to Vicious Biscuit (seriously delicious) which wasn’t *quite* as vicious as the last time we were there. Still, carb comas abound.

Tony had to fly to Miami for a real estate conference on Saturday afternoon. So after we dropped him off at the Charleston airport, the girls and I made a beeline for our favorite island of all time: Folly Beach! The weather was perfect—upper 70s and sunny, and the island was jammed with tourists. But we found a spot on the sand to watch dolphins and look for sharks’ teeth. It was absolutely worth the drive and the traffic to get back to our beloved Folly. And the food, of course, was to die for!

Even though I couldn’t get us a hotel room on Folly for Saturday night, there was no question that we would be returning for Sunday morning Mass. In the eight months we’ve been traveling, we’ve never met another priest nearly as engaging and entertaining as Father Babick at Our Lady of Good Counsel. After the service, Bella told him that we came back to church specifically for his homily. He honored us by saying that made his day and he promised to pray for our safe travels. God is good!!

Good Ol’ Days: Returning to Folly made me reflective and contemplative. When we first arrived on the island (on a sweltering, 90 percent humidity day in early October), I didn’t know whether I’d make it a full month or if the heat, sand fleas and lack of parking would drive me nuts. Well, the heat broke, we learned we could walk almost everywhere and I got used to ducking inside before the no-see-ums attacked. And I left a piece of my heart on what we discovered to be a laid-back, beautiful gem of an island. Did I appreciate every minute of the time we were there? Of course not. Like Bella pointed out today, “You don’t know you’re in the Good Ol’ Days until they’re over.” But what Folly did teach me is that first impressions can be misleading, and sometimes you have to settle in to a place for a bit and let it show you its own rhythm and ways instead of forcing it to adapt to your expectations and preconceived notions of how things “should” be. For that, dear Folly, I will forever be grateful.

Now Tony is back from Miami and we are parked at a little beachfront condo on Harbor Island—a gated sea community about 20 minutes from Beaufort. It’s peaceful here, very quiet and scenic. Just a short drive from Hunting Island State Park where we spent a day on the beach last November with Zac and Tammy. (Still seems surreal to be typing “beach” and “November” in the same sentence. I guess the expectations from a lifetime of Wisconsin winters gets pretty deeply ingrained!)

Since the sun is shining and the beach is calling, I’m not going to waste another second indoors. Thank you to all who’ve sent prayers and/or positive thoughts thus far. We are overwhelmed and humbled; now we just need to set a date for our triumphant return to Castle Rock Court 😊