F OU R I F BY S E A
the big
e z o o n s
after laying low for more than a year, what’s important seems clearer than before. by amanda mcdanel
market. The pumps were traded for flip-flops, the blazers An actor for beach cover ups. I composed the music of my life using became a governor. A reality star became president. the recorder, the tambourine, the hammer dulcimer, the A friend swears by the combination of a melted bongos and the steel drum. It was harmonious, original marshmallow and a Kraft single on a saltine cracker. My and beautiful. 11-year-old knows all of the words to “Get your Freak On” I believe the “great snooze of 2020” was similar to by Missy Elliot, as well as the entire Hamilton production. that cosmic nudge I once received, where everyone was That according to Yahoo Finance, the Outer Banks is the forced to take a collective pause, look around and think third most popular vacation destination. In. The. Country. about what exactly they wanted to wake up to when the And, to be honest, this whole past year just didn’t world righted itself, and the alarm clock rang its rousing make sense either. It’s been a crazy 365 (plus) days of bell. homeschooling, breakfasts for dinners, banana bread For my family, that became clearest when we began baking, Zoom and Google meets, attempts at deciphering planning a celebration for my daughter’s 11th birthday common core math logic, rising this past February. After a tough 11 months of social media consumption, and uncertainty, unsettlement and unfamiliar just generally living in what’s felt We needed that territory, her one request was to go to more than a bit like the real-life time together Disney World, a place we had visited on version of Groundhog Day. previous birthdays. In the aftermath of in one of our But, to be fair, it’s also been a 2020, however, it seemed to make NO year of unplugging, decluttering, favorite places sense. pitching the alarm clock, even if it was a Besides dealing with vaccinations, snuggling in the sheets, binge wisp of what it safety precautions and travel dilemmas, watching The Amazing Race, the operational details of the parks were camping in the backyard, trading used to be. less than ideal – and that’s putting it buttons for elastic waistbands, mildly. Park admissions were limited to shelving the high heels for slip-on 50 percent capacity, so you needed to flats, and celebrating each and every Tuesday with tacos. make reservations to enter any of the parks on It’s like the universe rolled over and hit the snooze any given day. There were no Fast Passes, no button to help us realize that maybe we weren’t doing it dining reservations, no parades, no shows, no right after all. character meet and greets, and you even had to Since I was a little girl, I’ve been searching for the make an appointment to walk up and purchase “Instruction Manual” to life. Wondering if I was doing a hot dog. it “right,” making the “correct” choices, following all The only thing that remained the same was the “rules.” Around 12 years ago, though, I picked that the prices. Makes perfect sense, right? manual up one morning, and it was as if it was written in The funny thing is, though, that for us, it an entirely different language. It was heavy and foreign, did. We needed that time together in one of and I finally realized – as I had likely known instinctively our favorite places even if it was a wisp of what all along – that this was not my story. So, I shelved that it used to be. Just being able to get out of our book, picked up a blank one and began to write. Making house and experience a new environment, to that single decision may have been the most important breathe fresh air, to feel the sunshine on our moment of my life. shoulders, and to enjoy the primal childhood Freed from the “shoulds,” the universe opened up for joy of laughter. me to let my freak flag fly. My home no longer looked We split the initial 12-hour drive into like a Pottery Barn catalog and more like an eclectic flea two days, spending the first night at the I OFTEN FEEL AS THOUGH I’VE SEEN A LOT OF
THINGS THAT JUST DO NOT MAKE SENSE.
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Hampton Inn in South Carolina where we celebrated Valentine’s Day by eating Cracker Barrell in bed. (While not the traditional romantic Valentine’s meal, if you haven’t experienced the joy of eating Cracker Barrell in bed, especially if it’s not your bed, I highly recommend it.) The next day we drove the additional six hours through cold and rainy weather until we reached Orlando, where we caught our first glimpse of sunlight in more than three weeks. With the windows rolled down and the music turned up, we arrived at our accommodations with huge smiles on our faces. Before even checking in, all four of us changed into bathing suits and belly flopped into the large pool, elated by the warm weather. The girls splashed and laughed, while I drank a giant frozen beverage out of a plastic palm tree-shaped glass. Before the day was over, I turned to my husband and said: If we leave tomorrow, it all would have been worth it. Disney World was just the icing on the cake. While my family jetted away from our home on the Outer Banks, many of you have just made the reverse trip to wind up on these shores seeking solace, connection and the natural beauty of the outdoors. So why did my family leave these islands, when it seems to be exactly the place to go to get away from it all? It may defy all logic, but I bet you understand deep down because the vacation you’re on right now makes precisely the same sort of sense to you. May we sit with these kinds of gut feelings and let them root all of our decisions in 2021 and beyond – because the way the universe unfolds is often right…we may just have to listen to that small voice inside ourselves in order to fully understand it.
The McDanel clan pause for a selfie on their trip to the Magic Kingdom.
