Month: April 2009

Grandma Snyder had her ninetieth birthday party yesterday, so we got to visit with her for the first time in several years. She’s managed to knock out two of her top teeth in a fall and refuses to have them fixed, so her laugh has become even more jolly. Three of our cousins were there as well, and it was cool to see three adults that looked a lot like the kids we’d last seen almost twenty years ago.

After the party (and a ridiculous amout of picture taking) everyone said goodbye, we joined mom and dad for dinner and on an (unsuccessful) search for manatees, attempted to spin a few donuts in the parking lot, then headed back to Orlando. After a five o’clock wakeup I managed a bit of sleep on the plane, and following a scheduled 9:30 landing it’s off to what may be a very long day of work.

Last night was the first time in three weeks that I slept at least seven hours without the assistance of drugs; Aaron says I was thrashing around all night, but thrashing is way better than lying in bed awake. We got up at 7:30 this morning and headed off to the Magic Kingdom. Typically on these trips I handle logistics, so having booked all arrangements and picked Aaron up at the airport my only remaining job was to get him to the park entrance with his park pass. Despite repeated reminders, I failed in this respect and we stared blankly at each other after the bus ride over upon realizing he didn’t have his entry ticket. Luckily customer service was able to look him up and put matters straight, and a short time later we were in the park.

Neither of us is huge Disney fanatics, but since we were in Orlando anyhow it made sense to pay a visit. Lines were short early in the day, and we managed to get soaked on Splash Mountain and make a visit to Thunder Mountain and the Haunted House in a short time. We later caught the Tower of Terror and a few other rides before enduring a fifty minute wait for the Aerosmith roller coaster. Surprisingly, this one turned out to be worth the wait, and after getting rocketed up the first hill and through several dark corkscrews Aarron actually asked “are we upside down right now”; I honestly couldn’t answer him.

Tomorrow it’s off to see several family members we haven’t seen in years. Additionally, the good state of Florida saw fit to install automated toll booths that accept only quarters. Since I had no change I now have the fun task of dealing with beauracracy to try to avoid two $100 fines; that one should be really fun.

The stress of the past few weeks has abated somewhat, but this weekend I get to escape a bit due to my grandmother Snyder’s 90th birthday party in Florida. I took the redeye out of LA last night, slept a bit with the help of one of those goofy inflatable neck pillows, and arrived at 6AM. The inner dork led me to Cape Canaveral, and the day was spent looking at spaceships. The Saturn V rocket is ree-diculous, although I won’t admit whether I did a little dance next to the engines when the crowd had cleared out.

Aaron arrives this evening, and we’re staying at the Animal Kingdom Lodge at Disney World. I got here at about 4PM, took a long nap, then went exploring – giraffes, ostriches, zebras, and these crazy long-horned cows surround the place, which more than makes up for the eight and a half billion kids running around. Nature Ryan is inwardly rebelling at the Disney-ification of Africa, but if I’ve got to be in Florida for a weekend it’s a not a horrible place to be. Tomorrow we get to relive our childhoods at the parks here, then Monday it’s off to see the family before heading home early Tuesday morning.

Three weeks ago today I was on a boat in the Caribbean watching whales… it seems like a really long time ago. Returning from vacations always seems tough as you go from an absolute thirst for life and living to a more mundane existence – for me the “day to day” life almost feels like a holding pattern at times, stalling for the more meaningful moments of existence. This return has been particularly harsh for some reason as the shock of the “real” world also came with other realizations – I’ve been in LA for several years now, always thinking that this is just a temporary stop; I’m doing a job that in the grand scheme of things isn’t really making the world a better place or changing people’s lives; I’m thirty-three and single… it’s all a bit heavy for a journal entry, but if this journal is meant to capture major life experiences then the past couple of weeks deserve a note.

I’m not one who handles a lot of anxiety well, and luckily I needed to lose some weight as it has been a rough time lately. But it’s not a bad thing – my dad’s sermons (Skipper is a retired minister, for anyone who wasn’t aware) used to repeatedly return to the subject of how the tough times in life are opportunities for self-discovery and change. And he’s very right – it’s often only when life begins to crack that we notice problems that were otherwise unseen. My dad and I haven’t always seen eye-to-eye, but he taught a good lesson in this case, and it’s one that makes it a bit easier to deal with anxiety by rephrasing the problem in terms of “this is an opportunity” rather than “this is a crisis”. I’m anxious for it to end, but also excited to see what revelations and changes will come out of it.