Briefcase on the Kitchen Table

First off I am glad to be back! The last three and a half months has been the longest hiatus I have taken from the blog since its inception. I apologize for that. It was a very stressful summer preparing for and taking the Bar Examination and did not leave free time to write. The Bar was at the end of July. I have never been more scared taking a test. Results have not yet come out so now we wait.

I had a week after the Bar exam to try and recover a bit and prepare for Avery and my long-anticipated vacation. Growing up I went to Holden Beach, North Carolina with my family for many, many summers. It is quite simply one of my favorite places on earth. It is a long white-sand beach on an island. There are no high rises and no jammed public beaches. You have your own house only fifty feet back from the water and the beach in front of your house is entirely your own. My family has not gone to Holden Beach since Avery and I have been married so, even after years of hearing me talk about this wonderful place, Avery had yet to see it.

We took off to drive through the night to South Carolina for a few days to see my twin sister’s new-ish place and then drove up to meet my parents, baby sister, and baby sister’s best friend to all head for a giant grocery trip (part of the beauty of the beach is you don’t even have to get in to a car for an entire week) and then on to the house. The only way on to the island is a huge arching bridge. When you reach the peak of the bridge there is nothing in front of you but wide open Atlantic. The sea is a green-blue with lines of white foam dotting the surface. I always roll down my windows once we hit the bridge; you can smell the salt and the seaweed and hear the seagulls and the waves.

What followed was an absolutely delightful trip. It was a whole week of eating, sleeping, reading on the beach, catching up with my family, eating some more, putting on sunscreen, riding the waves, and spending time with Avery. Most often during the trip I didn’t even know what time it was. That is so rare these days and it was so wonderful. I really reconnected with Ave. The Bar Exam was a stressful period that did not leave much time or energy to put into the marriage. Don’t get me wrong, Ave and I were absolutely fine; not fighting or anything. We just weren’t nearly as affectionate as normal which I think is only to be expected. The week at the beach was wonderful. My husband and I had time to play. We played frizbee, soccer, and cornhole. We played drinking games. We played card games every night. We played in the water. We built a huge sandcastle. We just read together. We sat rocking together in the chairs on the covered porch watching the sun set in complete, content quiet.

It was simply a perfect week. There is not a thing I would have changed about it. Avery was a superstar this summer; he handled all of the cooking and cleaning, bill paying and phonecall returning, and (most difficult) the stress management for two people. I could not have done it without him. After a summer of checking out of everything but studying for the bar what my marriage and my mental health needed was to check out of all of the other stuff; email, schedules, voicemails, you name it. It was only by checking out for an entire week that I was able to check back in with my partner and re-engage in wifedom.