So the last Venetian Ball of the season has come and gone. Photos were snapped, compliments given and champagne flowed. The night still pales in comparison to the Grand Balls that I’ve become used to over the seasons, but it remains a charming night and the guests love it. As Amras is constantly reminding me, for us these events are often an annoying interruption to the rest of our work day, but we don’t see them from the guest’s point of view. Besides, I like them.
My ribs lasted exactly 3 hours and 45 minutes before I had to free them from their steel cage and change into something more breathable, and my curling iron chose this night to run out of fuel (goodbye venetian ringlets, hello French roll), but it’s safe to say we all went out on a good note.
It feels strange to be so quickly leaving Europe behind us. The Caribbean will be on top of us before we know it. It’s always the contracts where you’re having the time of your life that go so quickly that they seem to be over before you can turn around twice. For the first time in a very – very – long time, I genuinely don’t feel ready to go home. Well, I’m ready, I’m always ‘ready’ to go home – but I don’t have that driving exhaustion that normally is in the back of my mind saying ‘you’re done, you’re finished, go home and get some sleep’.
Except for a dodgy week right in the middle where the stress of the whole department (and a few other things) hit me hard, everything is going right this contract. That said, it remains insanely busy and there are many times when I still feel like a headless chicken trying to get everything done, but I’m quite used to that.