Anticipation

One more day and Paul and I will be on our way to the Mediterranean! It is always exciting to plan a trip and to anticipate all the places we will see. This trip has been planned for at least one and one-half years. That time has been spent dreaming of the far away places we will see.

This will be the longest trip we have ever taken (26 days). For old people, like us, part of the preparation involves having enough pills to last 26 days!! Since insurance companies only dispense certain pills for 30 days at a time, and those days won't coincide with the days on our trip, I had to call to arrange ahead of time for enough pills to keep me alive until we get home. It is interesting that when we are young and very healthy, most of us can't afford the time or the money to go on great trips like this. When we are old and creaky, we can go, only to hope that the pills do us a favor and keep our bodies fit enough to enjoy the trip. (Oops, sorry; I reread my previous blog of our trip and saw that I wrote about pills there too! That is what you get for reading an old-person blog.)

Our friends the Paynes will be sharing this trip with us. Mary Ann and Dennis Payne introduced us to each other, so we owe them a great deal of thanks. They are wonderful traveling companions; we have spent many vacations with them. Before Mary Ann introduced me to Paul, she said, "I have a selfish reason for the two of you meeting. I hope that you fall in love and marry, and the four of us can travel the world together." That is exactly what happened! We are eternally grateful to Mary Ann and Dennis for making our journeys possible.

Wednesday we will spend on the plane (five hours to New York City and then nine hours to Athens, Greece). Doesn't that sound fun?!! Thursday we will arrive in Athens and embark on the Prisendam, which is our ship. On Friday, we dock at our first port, the city of Ephesus, Turkey. What an intriguing place to spend Halloween and my 63rd birthday. (By the way, I have spent many, many Halloweens and birthdays trying to teach English at Butler Middle School and Alta High School to hyperactive, sugar-saturated teenagers.)

I should promise myself that I won't eat everything in sight on the ship, but I won't do that. Hopefully, my uncomfortably full tummy after meals might reign me in a bit. Food, adventure, and friends--what an incredible way to spend November!