It’s summer, right? The yard needed mowing, the weeds were overtaking the garden, so I went to the beach.  Packed up the car and my son and drove 7 hours across North Carolina to a rented beach house on the Emerald Isle. It’s an awesome place for respite with crystal-white beaches and clear blue-green water. (“That’s probably why it’s called the Emerald Isle Mom,” my son pointed out when I mentioned it, “Boy! You didn’t get a full scholarship for nothin’.” I joked back. It’s an inside kind of joke but we have fun with it. Guessing where he got his brains is another favorite pastime.)

Emerald Isle is a family kind of island. Mercifully, the mega condos a hundred floors high have not arrived yet. There’s no McDonalds or Walmart, although it does have a Food Lion (thank you God, since I needed milk and yogurt!). I slathered myself in 50-proof sunscreen and hit the beach less than 15 minutes after I got there. At which point, I found that my son wasn’t the only 20-something celebrating the end of a college year on the beach. I’m not sure how he kept his eyes from falling out from all the teeny-tiny, polka-dot bikinis that ran the surf in giggly packs. The 20-something men accompanying them SHOULD have put on sunscreen. They were attempting to play beach Frisbee while guzzling numerous miscellaneous cans hidden in huggies to cut the pain of their scalded-red sunburns. (Oh shoot, I keep forgetting the proper terms for these things. They keep their cans in “snuggies.” My bad. Huggies are the diapers, now why can’t I keep that straight? It was all I could do not to buy them sunscreen, I’m such a Jewish mother. Not.)

It was probably the best beach trip of my life since I no longer own or wear a bikini nor do I care that I don’t or can’t.  My one-piece and baggy shorts are extremely comfortable and wearing them precludes any worry about the best way to get onto my beach towel and still look sizzling hot. I didn’t have to find the latest shade of hot pink with sparkles for my nails or spend hours grooming myself to wear some tiny, over-priced pieces of cloth the size of a BandAid. Been there, done that, never again.

I pitied the twenty-something girls who spent more time getting ready to go to the beach than they probably spent lying on it. I wanted to hand them a huggie (sorry, snuggie) and remind them that the guys hadn’t spent any time on grooming for the beach. Hello girlfriends, it’s obvious your buddy-boys are focused on drinking cases of beer and are pretty much oblivious to personal grooming issues. I wondered how the girls could watch the Frisbee games and not figure that out. Personally, I was impressed that the guys could still stand up long enough to go out to eat at night. Hey, I give credit where credit is due, you know?

Getting older has its privileges. Relaxed beach time is one of them! I hope your summer is filled with warm days and some sparkling water somewhere!