And so it’s September…
And it’s officially started feeling strange. Normally this time of year I’m in full swing-prep mode for the Grand Pacific. I’m going down lists of theme night requirements and ordering ball-gowns and checking to make sure all the admin work I put in place before I left the flagship for vacation is still in place now, I’m going through lists of trivia to make sure they’re accurate, and trying to catch up on my sleep because my schedule is about to take a drastic change.
That’s the path my life has taken for the past two and a half years. It’s what I’m used to. I’m not…used to being elsewhere, and as seriously happy as I am here, I feel somewhat off kilter for it. I mean the truth is I didn’t want to go to Asia this year, I was in even deeper need of a break from it than I realized at the time, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t feel strange passing my ‘baby’ over to someone else for a season.
In the meantime, I try not to think about it too much. In a flashback to two summers ago – and probably because Amras is on board, and because I’ve once again gotten to know most of the party band (or at least the singer, the rest of the musicians are mostly all new since our crew change-over in Barcelona), I’ve once again taken up party band hours, which are ever so slightly more taxing than I recall them being (what can I say, I’m older I guess), but I’m kind of enjoying being out again. This is one of those cases where I’m exceptionally grateful for Shadow, because her presence here lightens the workload so much.
I must say I’m not used to having this much time to myself. I mean it’s huge stretches of hours at a time. In some ways it’s fantastic, it certainly means I’m a lot more rested, but in others I simply don’t know what to do with myself – I mean I’m so used to being busy ALL the time out here. It’s true that there are always two of us on the flagship, but the workload there is different. The person who’s ‘off’ is as often as not running various activities and such, there’s no such thing as ‘I don’t start work until this evening’, here, with the way that Shadow and I have split the port day hours down the middle, that happens every other day. Literally.
So I’m reading a lot, and my meal schedule has become decidedly normal – something I never thought I’d say when I’m out here! And – and this will surprise most of you – my chocolate intake has dropped to nearly non-existent. I suspect that’s what lack of stress does to me.
But never the less, it still feels…very…very…strange.