In 1998, I bought a dress.

This may seem like no big deal, really, who gives a shit if I bought a dress, only it turns out this dress has become rather significant for me. I remember where I was when I bought it-it was your average American mall with your average American mall stores, and there was American Eagle, before it became stocked with clothing that a Kate Moss wanna-be would wear. They were having a sale on things, and I bought two tank tops, a purse, and a dress. The dress, if I remember correctly, cost less than $20.

I have worn that dress on every major holiday since. It was first worn on my trip to Singapore and Bali, and for that reason alone it was worth every penny as that holiday meant the world to me in many ways. More than that, that was the dress I wore on that magical Bangkok evening, the one in which Angus, being a gentleman and crossing a busy Thai street, took my hand to help me cross and shocked me right down to my core.

This trip was no exception. The dress came with me, as the dress always does. I should be glad that an eight year-old dress still fits me, and I am glad. It helps that the dress is empire waisted, thereby making the wearer look pregnant, bloated, or just a sloppy dresser, and on any given day I am the last two of those choices. It's not particularly flattering, but it is comfortable and I love it.

For example, here's me and the dress on the Greek Island of Amorgos in 2002.

And me and the dress in Langkawi Malaysia, also in 2002.

Here's me in that dress in the Cook Islands along with wet hair and a strange streaky sunburn.

I love that dress and hope I have it for years to come.

The day we left for the Cook Islands it was bright and sunny outside. Somehow, it seemed as though the bad weather that we had when we landed in California was a memory. We drove around and did some shopping, before heading back to LAX. At LAX we went through acres of security, security which drives both Angus and I wild with anger. Then we waited for our flight, the kids relaxing. Melissa had been feeling badly all day, so we dosed her with cold and flu medication and all of us took it easy.

On the flight we were able to move around-Angus, Jeff and myself each got a row of two to ourselves, and Melissa stretched out and slept on a row of four. It was an 8 hour journey to Tahiti, where the plane would stop before heading to the Cook Islands' destination of Rarotonga. The flight took off late in the evening, and all of us quietly went to sleep. I would wake up from time to time and cover Melissa and Jeff with the blankets they would invariably fling off, and then wind up shivering with cold.

At one point I woke right up and I didn't know why. I just sat straight up. I looked around and saw Melissa was awake.

'Are you ok, babe?' I asked her, as I padded up the aisle to her.

'Do you have more Tylenol?' she asked. I went and retrieved them, along with a bottle of water, and she slugged them down. She patted her hair and then looked at me. 'I think I'm going to be sick.'

'Are you going to be sick?' I asked stupidly.

'I'm going to be sick,' she re-iterated for the slow me. I frantically dove into the seat pockets looking for air sick bags. Wouldn't you know it, for the first time in ages there weren't any. As Melissa started gagging I leapt across the aisle and started looking at seat pockets that had passengers' things in them, while frantically punching the flight attendant call button. I finally found a bag when I raced over to Melissa-who promptly threw up over both of us before I could get the bag open. Once the bag was open, she continued hurling into it.

The flight attendant came up and viewed us warily. I explained the situation, and she fetched some ginger ale, more air sick bags and some vomit-free blankets. Melissa, having thrown up the contents of her stomach but not the Tylenol, confessed to feeling better.

I think, at that moment, I felt more like a mother than I ever have in my life.

When we got to Tahiti things got worse-she was feeling horribly and the sudden rush of heat made her throw up again. This was repeated when we finally reached the Cook Islands-we'd reached the tropical paradise and the vomiting kept coming. We hailed a taxi and, upon arriving at the condo, Melissa and Jeff trooped off into the swimming pool to cool down.

The place had the most beautiful spot-right on the beach, a loft-style home that had another downstairs bedroom for the kids. The good news was their bedroom was air conditioned. The bad news was the rest of the house wasn't. I was a little disappointed with the condo-it was a bit tatty, a bit of a drag. A cockroach raced up one wall and the kitchen cupboard handles were falling off the cupboards. I felt so let down-Melissa was sick, I was chugging Immodium tablets, and the condo was not the splendored bliss I'd hoped for.

Angus came to give me a hug as I peeled off my vomit garments. I told him I was disappointed with the place, and he asked me to think of all the tropical places I'd been-were the places like this? I thought about it and admitted they were. Case closed, he said. This was how life is in these kinds of places.

We changed and went outside with the kids. Leaping and playing in the pool, we all then jumped in the warm Pacific waters'¦and it was lovely. Although we wound up fighting a really hard current and giving up for the pool, the water was clean and bright and so warm to a winter-blistered soul.

We went to dinner that night, and Jeff exclaimed with marvel that the parking spaces in the parking lot were separated with a concrete divider. 'Don't you see, Helen?' he asked me. 'In America and in England they only use a white painted line to separate car parking. Here they use concrete! They are so rich here, this must be the richest country in the world!'

His breathless wonder was what did it for me. I realized that I was feeling a bit down but that this place really was paradise. It really was as amazing as a 9 year-old could see, and from that moment on it didn't bother me-I simply killed a roach if I saw it, I shooed lizards out of our bathroom with a grin. I didn't mind, I just loved being there.

We got to snorkel in the water, and if you've been here at my site for a while, then you'll know that one of my single greatest pleasures in life is to snorkel in warm water with the fishies. That's all I want to do. To just be with my head below water and the fish at my fingertips and to just swim, something I can do for hours and hours.

We also got to go diving. Angus and I had one dive together while Melissa had a discover scuba dive course (Jeff is too young, but he had a brilliant time on the boat. At one point they emptied the enormous plastic box onboard of its scuba gear and set him afloat in it with a flag, so that he could be his own Pirate of the Caribbean, albeit it was the Pacific.) On the second dive, Melissa joined us and the three of us swam in our swimsuits (we eschew dive suits) in the warm sea, marveling at everything around us.

We hired motor scooters, which is what everyone does on the island. The speed limit is very, very low and people drive around on the scooters instead of cars. In order to do this, Angus and I had to take a driving test, which we did successfully (although at least one person failed-as we started off an Aussie chick hit the accelerator instead of braking and slammed right into me. She failed, I passed, and I had a nice bruise on my back to prove that I was rammed by a redheaded motor scooter rider.) We toured the island this way, traveling via motor scooter around the whole island (all 32 km of it) and took our time snorkeling when we felt like it, eating when we felt like it, and driving into the jungle when we felt like it (the interior was something straight out of Jurassic Park, man. Dense.) Jeff always rode with me, his small arms around my waist and his endless questions and chatter amusing me.

Angus bought me a black pearl necklace-black pearls are found almost exclusively in the Cook Islands, and they are stunning. He bought me a gorgeous and flawless necklace with a fabulous setting, and now that we're home I've replaced the nylon thread it was on for a thin silver chain.

All of us fell asleep early every night and woke late all but one morning-early the second to the last day I woke to pee and saw that the sky was alight with a brilliant sunrise, so Angus and I went outside to enjoy it.

The days passed quickly, and looking back on it we didn't actually do that much, but that's all we needed-the kids stayed in the pool, I relaxed in the warm ocean waters every chance I got, Angus and I had nighttime al fresco sex, and above all, it has become a warm, beautiful memory.

We got ready for the next and biggest portion-our trip to New Zealand.

And when we got there, I couldn't believe it.

-H.

PS-more pictures are on the sidebar to the right in my Flickr account-some of them are amazing (in my humble I'm-not-a-photographer opinion).

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 05:01 AM | Comments (8) | Add Comment
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