OK, so our son and fiancée decided this summer to have one of those new-fangled “destination weddings” where the ceremony and honeymoon are combined (in that order). I’m told it saves the couple big bucks.
BUT IT COSTS THE ATTENDING GUESTS A MONTH’S SALARY!
Nonetheless, we were thrilled to be among those who were invited and fortunate that we had a month’s salary lying around our house in jars, cars, cushions and the washing machine. We flew American Airlines to Cancun, Mexico, and don’t let that irony escape you.
The resort is on the Caribbean shores and the water is so breath-taking that it made me want to be a great white shark. (Actually “great” and “white” do describe me.) As you look toward the horizon, the first 100 yards of water is the same color as the old Coca-Cola bottles. Then there’s a span of sea the color of golf courses. Finally, as the eye reaches out to the edge between water andsky, it is so blue it feels like you’re looking at liquid sapphires. Oh, and the sand is pure white…looks like salt…feels like sugar. But it is also “white hot.”
Two things struck us when we opened the door to our “suite”—the temperature fell 30 degrees and on the right side of the “great room” was a GREAT Jacuzzi. Well, I’m a huge fan of indoor water with seats, so my soul immediately said to my brain: “Forget the ocean and the eight acres of swimming pool. Head to the jets!” (I learned something very important when operating a Jacuzzi: the level of the water must be above the jets or those jets will shoot out water like a fire hose, and I’m hardly exaggerating.)
The one drawback to these amenities is that they deceive you into thinking 62 degrees is the temperature everywhere, but then you open the door and the heat turns what was a shirt 11 seconds ago into a carwash rag. Maybe it’s because Cancun is a lot closer to the equator, I don’t know, but that sun seemed to pierce cotton T-shirts and seer human skin. If an Arizonian can claim “a dry heat,” then Cancunians must call theirs “a wet heat.” Like Florida on steroids. Like a sauna set on “disintegrate.”
Maybe the best part of the experience was that everything at the resort was included in the package price. (The second best part was that the resort allows no children.) So though we deep down knew better, all restaurants seemed to serve FREE FOOD. Order a steak dinner and if you like it, order another one. And if you get hungry at 10:00 a.m. or p.m., order room service. As many times as you want. Ten plates of nachos? Not a problem. Platters of tacos? Fifteen minutes.
And guess what! There was a coffee place there. And I found it. And I discovered it made frappuccinos. Even though they were small and more foam than frap, I fed my addiction at least once a day. The cold smooth coffee was like the balm of Gilead. And I didn’t have to pay for it. And I could get as many as I wanted. An addict could go nuts in there. In fact, that should be a plaque on the wall: “An addict once went nuts in here.”
The Sunday afternoon wedding as the sun set over the western seas was, well, I don’t have to tell you, now do I? The bride and groom wrote their own vows, so when Ben began to read his (off his phone—such a post-modernist), I started bawling like an infant with diaper rash. He’s a writer, too, and he created a forever moment, that’s for sure.
What a five-day vacation! Incredible. Certainly worth brushing my teeth with bottled water and ordering from menus I couldn’t read.
I just hope the drapes and wallpaper in our suite have dried out by now.
[author image=”https://echo.snu.edu/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/wilcoxthumb.jpg” ] Prof. Jim Wilcox, Guest Contributor
Prof. Wilcox has taught at SNU for 35 years and still loves it. Seriously.[/author]