Escape

I took Friday off and got out of town with two young travelers. After a coupla hiccups--I was phoneless (lost it the night before) and nearly carless (stopped for donuts and managed to lock us out briefly)--we boarded the ferry for the Olympic Peninsula.
Flying the coop, even for just a day, felt relaxing and refreshing. Zipping along (car-ferry-car...ferry-car), we cackled at dumb jokes, snapped goofy photos, stocked up on Black Cats and a Powder Puff melange of fireworks, beachcombed, chowed down on Pop Rocks and Craisins and Mighty-O, argued, dozed, pit-stopped, had a spider freak out, Twi-harded in Forks, and eventually, at 1 a.m., dragged home, with a brief stop en route to pick up my found phone (gracias Hattie's).
Fun times used to make me sad. I was a morose, even Puritanical kid, and I guess I worried that I'd use up my good times ration card and suddenly life would revert to Kafka-level bleakness. Well, laissez les bon temps rouler, as they say in New Orleans.