The thrill of a job completed just isn’t doing it for me anymore.

Take laundry, for instance.

One might think that just the fabulous smell of fresh clean clothing would be enough. Or maybe the knowledge that YES, those underwear are, in fact, clean…without the sniff test!  Even the lack of “I have nothing to wear” whining in the morning SHOULD be reason enough to desire to do laundry.

It isn’t.

It’s come to this:

OH YEAH.  Thursday I’m getting on one of these shiny little numbers, a Disney Cruise Line ship for a few days with some with some other fun blogger ladies….no, not with my family…I know. I SUCK.

And they say I get to spend some time here…Castaway Cay.  I might get lost and stay a while. Not saying I will….just saying something could happen, you know?

But before I can get on the boat? I have to finish the laundry and a to-do list a mile long.  I might even time myself to see what I can do with the right motivation.

And?

The BEST.PART.EVER?

There’s a LOT of water involved in this trip.

Um…swimming, beaches, snorkeling…and they have denied my request to wear sweatpants during these outings.

I’m supposed to wear one of these:

Which, I KNOW I just said I was going to think better about my body self-image. But seriously. I think we all know it’s going to feel a lot less:

and waaaay too much this:

Sexy, ain’t I?

At Aiming Low, we call it “Times when you’d better wear a diaper cause chances are good you might pee a little”.

(I don’t even watch The Office and this is funny…probably because I love Ali Martell…no, I REALLY love Ali Martell)

I mean, come on, there’s not a lot of people you’d want to take a week-long trip with…together 24  hours a day…eating your meals together…sharing all those wonderfully intimate bodily functions.

But I did it with eight ladies of Aiming Low.

It was like the sorority I never got to be a part of in the college I didn’t attend.

It was the Sisterhood of the Traveling Heads.

We did all those things that you give up when you get too old for “sleep overs”.  We ate pizza in bed and laughed so hard we (where WE = Jen) snorted out our nose…we made fun of each other, we stayed up way too late in the night, we called boys and hung up on them.  We let ourselves get back to the parts of us that aren’t buried beneath responsibility, dinner plans, and school pickup schedules.

This trip was full of so many firsts.  Ground Zero, Time Square, Central Park, Boston’s amazing color show, NYC cabbies, The Russian Tea Room, having my life threatened by a homeless person, and the smells….OHTHESMELLS….and the joy of sharing these moments with these special friends, every second cementing our friendships a little deeper.

Thank you, ladies, for taking what could have been a fun trip and turning it into the experience of a lifetime.

Which, if I’m wrong, just let me know so I can post my 450-photo montage of Ralph from the Tiger Beat years.  Just kidding, I don’t really have one.  Yes, I TOTALLY do. NO, really, I would never make one. I think we all know I would. Because that would be C.R.A.Z.Y. *ahem*

Moving on.

TRIPS!!!!

I got back bright and early Saturday from the Aiming Low Boston/NYC parties…tired, happy and ready to see my family….

…..and promptly have come down with the death.  Also known as the flu.  Hoping it’s not going to drag on forever (also hoping Peter does not come down with it as he is less than pleasant when he’s sick)(or the kids really because I can only deal with so much puke)(not that I have a limit or anything, it’s more a guideline than a rule)(and now I’m sort of having an anxiety attack thinking of how much potential puke is in my future).

Again, moving on.

Boston and NYC were incredible, our parties were a hit and the time spent with friends were unforgettable.

There will be more details when I stop having to get up from the computer to go visit the Porcelain God.

So, now? I leave you with lots and lots of pictures.  LOTS of them.

I’m writing this from the Atlanta airport…drinking a cup of mediocre coffee, a man who needs to rethink his commitment to deodorant on my left and the poor frazzled mother of five youngsters playing wrangler on my right.  Did I mention that the Jonas Brothers are booming from the TV?  Stellar!

I have found the ninth level of hell.

The level directly after being taunted onto a trampoline and realizing mid-jump you HAVE to pee.

However, I can’t even be bothered by it.  I just keep drinking my crappy coffee and smiling at the thoughts of what’s to come.

This trip is so many things.

It’s an opportunity for fun, yet very much a business trip and every stop between those two.

It’s also another big scissor step into a life that isn’t weighed down by cancer.

I took the first trip without my kids in February and felt like I was going to have an anxiety attack the entire first twenty-four hours.

Yet, last night I was able to kiss and smoosh and goodbye each of my children with less guilt than expected and more confidence that this trip was a good thing for me to do.

Partly because I know that they WILL survive without me, and as hard as it is to believe, I can survive without them. In fact, I am a BETTER mom when I’ve had the chance to miss them.

I’ll get home and just burst into sparkly fountains of joy at the sight of their familiar faces.  I’ll think they may have actually managed to grow in five days time. I will soak in the sounds of their voices and be overwhelmed with motherlove so intense it makes my teeth hurt.  I will wonder how I ever managed to breathe so far from them.

And then one of them will do something completely jackass and I will sigh and get back to the business of being their mom.

But for those SIX minutes it’ll be utter BLISS!

Don’t forget to check out the new posts over at Aiming Low!