This is gonna be GREAT!<\/p>\n
First day, we are run over in the elevator by REAL snow-birds getting the hell out of here. I strike up a chat with one who says \u201cGotta get out before all the spring breakers bring that Corona virus here!\u201d He\u2019s frantically bumping the cart, carrying everything he owns, into the walls and door frames as he pushes it down the hallway. I stopped on the walkway to the beach, thought about what he said and then promptly went out onto the beach and stuck my head right in the proverbial sand.<\/p>\n
By now the texts from home are becoming more frantic by nature, and I\u2019m starting to feel a bit anxious. My mother is texting me that my brother is dropping off \u201cammo\u201d (a word a mother should never use) for her gun, because \u201cwe\u2019re all going to martial law!\u201d I immediately picture rioting and pillaging in the streets and my mother crouched behind her sofa loading her gun. \u00a0 My mom\u2014the woman who can\u2019t open a bag of croutons.<\/p>\n
\u201cThink we should go home?\u201d I ask pouring myself some wine.<\/p>\n
\u201cAre you feeling nervous?\u201d husband looks concerned.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo, why do you ask?\u201d picking up the salad bowl of wine with both hands.<\/p>\n
By this time, stores at the beach have started to run low on items as well. The panic has finally trickled its way from Atlanta, everywhere, to the quiet shores of Alabama. We hit three stores looking for various items, give up, and end up in a tacky souvenir shop getting a 1970\u2019s airbrush t-shirt made, and putting pirate hats on each other\u2014don\u2019t tell me we don\u2019t know what to do in a crisis! Deny, deny, deny! Look at us! It\u2019s like we don\u2019t even know it\u2019s the end of the world!<\/p>\n
I quickly deduce that my culinary talents are about to be fully tested. I laugh at the irony of my fully stocked kitchen at home which I could cook a gourmet meal for 12 people at a moment\u2019s notice but where am I during the zombie apocalypse food shortage? At a rented beach condo with two tangerines, a bag of pistachios and a half a bag of pork rinds, because pork rinds are low carb and I\u2019ve been low carbing it since January1st\u2014New Year\u2019s Resolution, right? Yeah, well that was before Corona scared us all into thinking that every meal might be our last. This is a crisis french onion dip can\u2019t possibly stand up to. I\u2019m eating potato chips dipped in carrot cake now.<\/p>\n
Corona is nipping at our heels. \u00a0At this point the beaches were still open and some college spring breakers had made it into town. No worries. It\u2019ll be fine. I\u2019m not talking to anyone on the beach\u2014God no! I\u2019m not even looking at them. But it\u2019s there\u2014looming. I\u2019m an Empath, so I can always feel things coming before they actually arrive, and as I sat there that day looking at the drunk kids having the time of their lives on the beach I wanted to tell them to run the other way\u2014away from me. I felt like the witch in Hansel and Gretel\u2014I might as well just shove all these kids into my oven.<\/p>\n
The restaurants were still open too so that night, at 4:30 to avoid \u201cpeople,\u201d we sat outside overlooking a beach full of bikini clad co-ed\u2019s who were sharing drinks, touching, kissing\u2014Oh my God, stop! Have none of you taken Microbiology?! Cooties! The mother in me wanted to stand up and send them all to their rooms, collectively. I felt it then\u2026they were going to close the beaches<\/i>. The Hudgins curse had now befallen all of Baldwin County Alabama.<\/p>\n
Next morning\u2014beaches closed<\/i>. Uh-huh. Shocker to no one.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s funny how you start to bargain mentally, offering yourself consolations when you get disappointed:<\/p>\n
\u201cMaybe we can still WALK on the beach but just can\u2019t sit out there?\u201d NO.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis should be a private part of the beach, I don\u2019t think it will pertain to\u2026\u201d NO.<\/p>\n
\u201cCan we still go out early morning and then just come in before\u2026? NO.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat if we just walk to the edge of the\u2026?\u201d NO.<\/p>\n
\u201cOK, well, we still have the pool.\u201d NO.<\/p>\n
\u201cCan we even look at the beach?\u201d NO.<\/p>\n
It reminded me of a cartoon I saw once showing two guys casually chatting amongst the burning flames of Hell, one looks down at his cup and says \u201cMan, they\u2019ve thought of everything, even the coffee\u2019s cold.\u201d<\/p>\n
I had my birthday here. Planned it that way, because how fun would that be right? To get to celebrate your birthday at the beach\u2014that you can\u2019t go on? Or look at? Lucky for me, I have a husband who made sure I still got to celebrate so he took me to the Bon Secour Wildlife Refuge\u2014lured me there with beignets no less. I fell for it thinking it was going to be like a petting zoo.<\/p>\n
\u201cAm I going to get licked by a baby deer?\u201d NO<\/p>\n
\u201cGet to hold cute cuddly things in my lap?\u201d NO.<\/p>\n
With powdered sugar still in the corners of my mouth, I was starting to get the feeling that I had been duped.<\/p>\n
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<\/p>\n
Just look at him. He knows I\u2019m about to hate this.<\/p>\n
It was hiking through miles of sloped sandy trails, boob sweat, peeing in the woods with no-see-ums biting my ass, and looking over my shoulder for an alligator the whole time. It was basically Missy\u2019s \u201cAlabama birthday boot camp.\u201d Plus every time we met someone on the trail I had to do quick social distancing math in my head, \u201cIs that six feet? Wait\u2026no\u2026move back.\u201d For the record, boob sweat and math do not a Missy birthday make. He also forgot my birthday presents at home in Atlanta, but he did say \u201cHere, I\u2019ll let you have the last tangerine for your special day.\u201d No scurvy for me, \u00a0just \u00a0like celebrating my birthday in 1887.<\/p>\n
So here we are. Beaches closed. Restaurants closed. I\u2019m trapped with a man who doesn\u2019t drink, hardly eats, doesn\u2019t really talk, and has dedicated over half the kitchen counter space to his work computers. I\u2019ve voluntarily sequestered myself to the condo balcony because I can \u201cmake noise\u201d out there.<\/p>\n
All personal hygiene or lack thereof is in full swing here. I\u2019m on a quest to see how long I can go without washing or styling my hair or wearing make-up. The seagulls don\u2019t seem to mind. I saw a picture of Rita Wilson online yesterday and realized I \u201clooked\u201d far sicker than she does (btw, God Bless Tom and Rita). I\u2019m just sayin,\u2019 I don\u2019t think keeping people six feet away from me is going to be a problem.<\/p>\n
A trip to the grocery store channels my inner, Lara Croft Tomb Raider\u2013gear up, scan the perimeter, suspend myself from the ceiling so as not to touch anyone or anything, dodging people who are breathing. I get home and my husband tells me I have a hole in my shorts. \u201cOh I\u2019m sorry! I didn\u2019t realize it was a garden party, I thought it was a pandemic! I should have worn my NICE shorts to brave the killer virus germs at the store to get your dinner! Silly me! We\u2019re all just trying to survive here man!\u201d<\/p>\n
The unpacking of groceries is now followed by a Silkwood<\/i> hot shower brillo scrubbing.<\/p>\n
One of my favorite lines from,\u00a0Christmas Vacation,\u00a0<\/em>we\u2019ve used daily, \u201cI don\u2019t know what to tell you Audrey, it\u2019s the holidays (or a pandemic)<\/i>, we\u2019re all miserable.\u201d<\/p>\n Now, I know what you\u2019re thinking \u201cPoor things, quarantined at the beach, wah-wah\u2026\u201d and I agree. I\u2019m not making light of the fact that our worst quarantine situation here by far outweighs the best quarantine at home . We can still look at the beach (if we don\u2019t get caught)! And that beats watching pandemic TV or walking my mom through loading her gun over the phone\u2026<\/p>\n \u201cMom. Mom. No. It\u2019s on the bottom. The bottom Mom. No, the other way. No, you can\u2019t turn it off and back on again\u2026Mom. Listen. Ok, let\u2019s start over\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n Everyone please stay safe\u2014wear clean underwear like your mom always told you to, \u201cjust in case,\u201d maintain your sense of humor, and we will get through this. We can do it!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" So a year ago, my husband and I made it a 2020 plan to relocate for a month to the beaches of Gulf Shores in March, \u00a0just to test out our snow-birding abilities. Translation: see if we can live together in a small condo and not kill each other. And if you\u2019ve read my blog … <\/p>\n