This weekend we’re heading up to Rice Lake to stay in a rented cottage with our friends Andy and Kelly. Andy was one of Graham’s groomsmen in our wedding last year, and they are also now “brothers” in the sense that they are members of the same carpenter’s union. This works out great for Kelly and I, because they now have each other to talk about carpenter stuff. It’s not that we don’t like to listen to the carpenter stuff…we like it just fine. We like it just about as much as Graham likes to talk about editorial standards or grammar. Or as much as Andy likes to talk about deadbeats who don’t pay their taxes (Kelly works for the Ministry of Finance).
Andy and Kelly are our one remaining friend-couple who also don’t have any kids. One of the last times we got together with them, Andy said something like, “You guys must be startin’ to think about having a family, eh?” (Could he be more Canadian?) And I was all “BACK OFF!” Actually what we said was the standard DINK drone answer: “Not right now, blah blah blah, we like our life the way it is, blah blah blah, we want to travel and pay our bills first, blah blah blah…”
Anyway, so this cottage is only about an hour away from our house, and it’s the place where Graham asked me to marry him. It’s also the place we went to for our honeymoon and gained five pounds each over the course of that one week. You see, I find it impossible to eat healthy up there. I’d love to be one of those people who packs fruit, vegetables and grains and yogurts to snack on by the lake, but I’m more like one of those people who packs beer, chips & dip, steak and salsa. At least the salsa is fat-free, if you don’t count the tortilla chips and guacamole that inevitably go with it.
Graham and Andy both like to fish, and the fishing on Rice Lake is really good. Graham caught a big bass on our honeymoon, and then caught some pickerel there while I was in Chicago. The fact the two guys like to fish together is terrific because it means that I don’t have to go out with Graham on the boat with a book that I will become too nauseated to read and then have to think seriously about blowing chunks over the side. I asked Kelly if she likes to fish, and she said, “No, not really, I prefer to just sit on the beach with a book and a drink.” My heart swelled with joy. So Graham and Andy can play with their worms (heh) and catch fish while us girls get loaded in the afternoon on the beach. Eating chips and dip.
I can’t wait.
Hurrah! DINKs! I think we both know how hard those are to find.
I do find that’s one advantage of living in a place where I really don’t know a lot of people and where I hang out by myself all the time. I’m immune to peer pressure, because I would have to have peers in the first place. Instead I’m like “No one I know is even having kids!” By which I mean no one in my living room. If I were still in my hometown, maybe I would be freaking out about not having children, but I am blissfully insulated here by my own unpopularity.
Well, and then there are the derby girls, but as you can imagine, they’re not exactly knitting booties. (Baby bumps can really screw up one’s center of gravity, I guess.)
Have fun with your DINKs!
Sounds like my kind of weekend (reading and getting loaded on the beach, I mean). I do recall someone boasting once that blowing chunks over the side of the boat is a really good way to attract the fish. I’m not sure I’d want to eat a fish that just consumed some of my (or someone else’s, for that matter) vomit.
Awww – Sounds like a fantastic place. So peaceful. And guacamole is one of the basic food groups, no?
Ooh. Have a great time. Sounds ideal. I’m jealous now …
Ahhhhhhhhhhh. Bossy remembers serenity. Just don’t get roped into painting anything while you’re there…
When my sweetie and I got engaged last month, we were commenting to someone that it won’t be long until the kid-pressure starts, now that the marriage-pressure will deminish (or at least it will when we set a date). She told us that when people ask her when she’s having kids (she and her hubby are in their late-30s and determined to be DINKs forever), her response is, “kids give you rashes”. That response shocks people into silence long enough that she’s able to change the subject.
Have a great weekend! That place looks like heaven…