How (Not to) Relax at the Beach

My friend Cindy and I love the beach and we take day trips to the ocean as often as we can. We both work at middle schools and this year has sucked the life out of us! Of the 10 years that I've worked at OCPS, this is by far the most stressful year I've had, with my year at the ghetto school a close second. I wake up in the middle of the night, thinking about my students. I wake up in the morning with a headache. I leave school in the afternoon and drive to the chiropractor who manipulates my spine into place after I've been sitting at my desk, tensed up all day while juggling in-person students with the students learning from home. But knowing that administration appreciates me makes it all worthwhile. 😑

So Cindy and I decided to take a day trip to the Gulf for a little relaxation and Vitamin Sea. Brooklyn was free today so she and I piled our tent and bag of beach things into the back of Cindy's vehicle. I grabbed the handle of the truck when Cindy called out, "Oh, the locks are broken. I'll open the door from the inside." Then she instructed me to reach around and unlock the back door for Brooklyn. "The locks are broken, but the truck drives like a dream!" Cindy asserted. In fact, her husband had checked the oil and filled the tires with air just the day before so the truck would be all set for us to go.

We traditionally stop at Starbucks before we begin our beach journeys. As Cindy placed the order, she debated between a grande and a venti coffee. Needing a good hit of caffeine, she opted for the venti, knowing that we'd be stopping halfway to the beach to find bathrooms anyway because neither Cindy nor I can make it all the way without stopping. I mean, Cindy carried a whole litter of kids at once with her triplets, in addition to one more. And I've given birth 6 times so basically we pee when we sneeze. Ingesting 20 ounces of coffee does not help in the bladder control department. 

About an hour into our trip, as Cindy and I were starting to think - we're going to have to find a bathroom soon, we came to halt on I-4 because well, it's I-4. I-4 is literally always at a standstill no matter what time of day, time of year, amount of construction, or kind of weather. As we slowed to a stop, the truck died. In the middle of I-4. I-4, the highway which has earned the title of The Most Deadly Interstate in the U.S. That I-4. Cindy was able to get it started and inch forward a bit before it died again. Putting on the hazards, she desperately tried to get the engine to start once more. The truck turned over and Cindy looked for an opening to move over to the shoulder. Thankfully, we were at an overpass with an exceptionally wide shoulder so Cindy was able to stop the truck far from the traffic lanes and in the shade of the road overhead.

Cindy called her husband, but he was busy helping a friend and didn't want to leave to come get us. I thought about calling Clayton to come pick us up, but he's never driven on I-4 and I didn't think it would be a good idea to send him on an hour-long trek on the interstate by himself.

Next, Cindy tried calling AAA, but she wasn't getting good reception on her cell phone. I told her to go to the AAA app because that could pinpoint our exact location for the tow truck since we weren't exactly sure where we were. Unfortunately, the app wouldn't load because again, she wasn't getting good service. I pulled up the app on my phone and went through the process of requesting service. As I was about to submit the request, Cindy said, "No wait, if you request service, it'll go against your membership, not mine. You only get so many requests a year." So I closed the app and put my phone on speaker, and while she spoke with the folks at AAA, I pulled up my Waze map to pinpoint our position.

Because of Covid, the tow company can't give us a ride, not that the three of us could've piled into the cab of the tow truck anyway. Cindy thought about calling an Uber, but Ubers don't pick people up along the side of the road. Sooo, we had a tow truck coming for the truck within the next hour or so, but we had no way to get home. And the tow truck wouldn't pick up the broken-down vehicle and leave us just standing there on the side of the road, so we needed to coordinate a ride home for us that would get there at the same time as the tow truck. 

As we were trying to figure out how we were going to get home, Brooklyn decides she can no longer "hold it." Cindy passed an empty Starbucks cup to Brooklyn and told her to climb over the seat into the back of the Expedition to pee in the cup. When she was done, Brooklyn held her grande salted caramel cream cold brew urine with an expression like Now what? We instructed her to dump it out the window while thoughts of the Seinfeld episode where Jerry needed to pee, but they were lost in a parking garage went though my head. "But officer, I could get Uromysitisis poisoning and die. That's why!...Do you think I enjoy living like this?...the shame, the humiliation...You know I have been issued a public urination pass by the city because of my condition. Unfortunately my little brother ran out of the house with it this morning." Cindy and I looked at each other, wondering who would be next, and knowing full well that neither of us would be able to hold it for another hour. And unlike my skinny little 15-year-old daughter, neither of us relished the thought of flipping our um, fluffy 50-year-old frames into the back of the vehicle to pee.

Cindy dialed her best friend because asking someone to get up and drive an hour down I-4 on a Saturday definitely falls into the - something you could only ask of a best friend of 40 years category. I listened to Cindy's end of the conversation. "I have a huge favor to ask! I'm stuck on the side of I-4 with my friend Dawn and her daughter. I need you to come get us please! We were going to the beach. What beach do you think? Anna Maria. It's not that far. But the truck broke down. It think it's a coil."

"But it drives like a dream," I interjected.

"Rick is helping a friend," Cindy continued the conversation. "I may have to kill him. We're on I-4, off to the shoulder. Somewhere in Lakeland. No, before that exit. You can't miss us; we're off to the side under an overpass. Okay, thank you!!!"

All set. A tow truck is coming in an hour, and Cindy's friend and her husband should get here in an hour. Perfect. Or well, not exactly perfect because perfect would be us relaxing on a beach, listening to the waves right now. But at least we were off to the side out of danger, we were in the shade thanks to the road overhead, and we had people coming to get us.

With that all set, we were able to relax a little. However, now that the plans were all made, we didn't have anything to occupy our minds and our thoughts turned back to needing to pee. Cindy grabbed a box of crackers to munch on. "If I eat these, maybe they'll soak up enough urine that I won't have to pee.

Brooklyn and I looked up from our phones, eyebrows raised. "Yes, that's how digestion works," I replied drily.

"I know that's not how digestion works, but I'm trying to fool my brain so I don't wet my pants!"

"Bet you're glad you got the venti now."

"At least we're all wearing bathing suits," Brooklyn piped up from the back seat.

"Right!" I agreed. "And if your friends take too long to get here, instead of finding us a bathroom, they can just pull over in front of someone's yard, and we can grab their garden hose and rinse off."

"Stop making me laugh!" Cindy begged.

"Roll up your window! Oh my God! Brooklyn lock your door! Lock the doors! Oh my God!"

Cindy is completely freaking out which in turn, is freaking us out. I roll up my window and see in the side mirror that a car has pulled up behind us. I'm thinking a good Samaritan is stopping to see if we need any help. Cindy is thinking an axe murderer is stopping to kill us. A man gets out of the car and walks a few feet, stopping at the front of his vehicle. He pours some water on his face, and scrubs it with his hands. Cindy was in full-on panic mode at this point. "I have my foot on the gas! If he comes closer, I'm driving!"

"I don't think he's even coming here. It's okay."

"His belt is undone!" Cindy yelled. "I'm ready to drive!"

The guy walked around and got back into his car without giving us a glance. He started driving, but not out toward the lanes of traffic; he drove up between us and wall. Cindy was ready to floor it while she formulated plans to acquire her concealed carry weapons permit, but the guy continued to drive forward before merging into traffic. He was completed oblivious to us.

Not too long afterwards, the towtruck driver called to let us know he would be there in about 10 minutes. A couple minutes later, Cindy's friends pulled up. We climbed out of the truck and stood there while waiting for the towtruck. 

"It smells like urine out here."

We looked around innocently. "Hmmm, that's weird."

We transferred our belongings to their car and hopped in. After thanking them profusely, we begged them to take the first exit and find a gas station so we could pee. They took the first exit and we drove along. And drove. And drove. But alas, there were no gas stations. No restaurants. No anything. So we wound our way back to the interstate. Signs indicated that there were gas stations, hotels, and restaurants at the next exit so we pulled off there. And drove. And drove. And drove.  There was nothing. Absolutely nothing. 

"Well, worst case scenario is that we head back to I-4 and go to the next exit," Cindy's friend said.

"No, worst case scenario is that Cindy and I have to pay you to get your car detailed in order to get the urine smell out."

We finally found a Sunoco and pulled in. 

"Um guys, do you see the bars on the windows and the gunshot hole in the glass?" I asked.

"Oh my gosh! I don't know if that's a bullet hole. It looks like someone took a baseball bat to the window."

"Is that really better??"

"No! Keep going! Find another bathroom!"

We found another gas station and ran inside (which really says something about how badly I needed to go because I didn't have on any makeup and I was wearing a bathing suit, and I never go out in public like that!)

We finally all made it home thanks to Cindy's friends. Cindy may be digging a shallow grave in her backyard for her husband who didn't come pick us up, but probably not since he'll be the one to fix the truck. And I learned some lessons for our little adventure.

Don't drink coffee (or really anything) on the way to the beach.

I need to talk Cindy out of obtaining a concealed carry permit.

Wear normal clothes and make-up when going to the beach. Just in case.