cape cod vacation report

day one:
want to leave by 10 am. make it out the house by 2:30pm. get to cape cod 11p.m. (i.e. take 4 hours longer than mapquest predicted). swear to not do this ever again. then remember have to come back to nyc.
realize I shouldn't have let dario trick me into coming to cape cod without him. now stuck with all work of two little kids by myself. mom here but as guest mostly. cannot take more than an hour with two-year-old then cracks and has hysterical fit. realize where my patience (or the lack of it) is coming from.

day two:
enlist my mother for only a minute of toddler watch, while I help Rosa carry something upstairs. come back down. mom is making tea and maia is gone. I run outside. no maia. run to front of house (where street is) and catch last glimpse of maia disappearing in neighbor's yard carrying a basketball. I dart on street and break all currently existing olympic sprinting records to get maia from neighbor's yard. want to cry and stuff but can't. want to beat her but can't. don't know how to make her understand that such behavior is terrorizingly scary. maybe I should beat her after all so she'll remember. but can't. too happy and grateful that nothing happened.
mom feels guilty but doesn't know what to say. me neither. starting to get cured of my latest house hunger (i.e. no more desire for any suburbian life. begin to appreciate confinements of city apartment living.)

day three:
finally make it out the house and to the beach before sunset. it's kinda cold. bathing suit is put ad acta (probably for the better anyway. post-partum body view spared to poor onlookers).
maia collects seashells with grandma while I try to shield my 4-month old (nayla) from hurrican-like winds.
when leaving beach mom can't find her sandals. claims have cost her a hundred bucks. she's close to crying so I decide to swallow my comment that they look like "payless". damn ghetto cape cod bastards must have stolen shoes. ;) ... mom can't see humor in any of my comments. is close to panic. tell her that shoes have probably been carried up the hill to exit by someone thinking they've been lost. turns out to be true. mom relaxes. I make mistake to tell her that panic in her eyes about lost shoes has been more strikingly intense than panic when Maia got lost. meant it as joke but mom doesn't think it's funny. is offended.
exhausted. fall asleep at 9pm when putting down kids. get back up 11:30. everyone went to bed. go to 7-11 to full-fill bad cravings. pay 8 dollars for ice-cream i didn't want to pay $4 for earlier in day while shopping at normal-prized supermarket. don't give a shit. deserve it.

day four:
things begin to be a blur. need sleep and another parent in the house whom I can blame as responsible. maia now accomplished escape artist. all features of house which looked great on website before arrival have now turned into dearly hated toddler dangerzones (hot-tub in back, second floor deck, huge house, etc.). need food. no time to eat. have lived on oreo-cookies all day while the rest of the vacation troop (13 people) eat lobster for lunch and dinner.
contemplating about ways to keep track of 2-year old. seriously consider henna-tattoo on Maia "If lost, please call ...". Fantasize about implantation of GPS device in toddler. must come in handy when teenager, too. good investment. wonder if possible.
other alternatives: dog-collar thingy (electric fence?) .. too cruel? .... beeper thingy ...but not effective cause will only let me know when toddler moves further than 20 feet away... -> but where to??...so basically, is device that tells me kid is lost.

day five:
need vacation from vacation.
decide to take mom and kids to beach far away from all.
nice day. mom walks/dances with baby in snugli and Santana in ear up and down the shore. then waves to couple of sea-lions close by shore. I try not to look related to her. she calls me loudly (because headphones on) "Siiiiisi, wave to the sealions!!! Come on! They can see us!"
I pretend to be very involved with maia's sand-castle architecture (..... sand-castle desperately in need of both - architecture and involvement).
after beach we go to Provincetown. loving it although temperatures and winds call for immediate trip to sweater shop. explain to mom that P-town is eldorado of gay people. Mom didn't realize and begins to pay attention. entertaining to watch mom. ;)
eat seven dollar cheese sandwich. decide to skip the coke(save money) and go home for thirst quenching.

day six:
long night. when it's not the kids it's my too vivid imagination keeping me up. can't get over the fact that we're staying in an old schoolhouse (from 1800s). have made mistake of reading historical clippings framed in hallways. saw one picture of little kids with creepy looking eyes. beg not to read about any deaths in article next to picture. read about death of one child in front of school-house. struck by horse-carriage in 1846. school-house closed after that. .... sigh. won't sleep now for sure. ...what's that noise???
Adam (one of Rosa's kids) tells me plot of The Others. ... really didn't need to know that.
decide I want to go home now. maybe better for all of us.

day seven:
dario arrives. praise the lord. i get a day off! or something like it.
i get sick. spend day in bed. come out only in evening to look for some food and coffee. try to heat up old coffee in microwave. cup very hot. spill it all over my hand. in pain bang my ankle on open kitchen cabinet door. "first-aid" myself with anti-burn cream and such. return to bed.

day eight:
last day at beach. freezing but I'm making dario walk in sand with me. i'm having my romantic walk on the beach and that's that. Dario cuts himself on seashell. Maia climbs onto life-guard tower. ... and mom is dancing to Santana somewhere with baby wipped around by wind.
plan to leave cape no later than 8pm. make it out the house by 11pm. positive onlook: no holiday traffic now for sure and kids asleep (no stopping, no screaming, no hassle). going 80mph most of the way arrive in nyc 4 hours later. Maia awake. 3:15 am. Decides she wants to play with her "little people". too tired to argue. Maia goes to sleep 4 am. wakes up 11 am. consider this method for future use, when getting to bed late. just wake up maia in middle of night to play for while, so she'll sleep in the morning. Bad parenting anyone? .... Unfortunately, I still have to get up with baby at 7 a.m. Day flies by my deliriously tired self. Take afternoon nap. Leave house with kids at sunset to get at least a little bit of fresh air. Pick playground where something must have died a week ago in the neighbouring woods. Feel like puking most of time. Maia seems to not care. Have to drag her out after we (adults) cannot possibly take it any minute longer.