Hot date and a cold shower

Zach and I celebrated our wedding anniversary and not knowing any babysitters we brought the kids out to dinner with us. You know: a date with the kids where, being without a car, we hike up a long, very steep mountainside road to arrive looking like sweat-drenched beggars. Good times. If there is anything that will make you appreciate the civilized essence of ice cubes, it is a hike like that.

The view from the restaurant patio is beyond spectacular and after taking a few pictures, we sat down to order. Our waitress, a pretty, local young woman with a dazzling smile approached to greet us. Before she said anything, our five-year-old daughter announced, “I’d like a cocktail, a tall one!” She said it with such confidence and sounded like she says this all the time with ordering it, "tall." We all looked astonished. The waitress looked to us with raised eyebrows and slight look of panic. I quickly realized that there is a plastic table tent displaying a luring picture of a tall, iced beverage adorned with fruit and a cocktail umbrella under the large caption ‘COCKTAILS’. Back paddling, I quickly say, “Oh, we don’t give her cocktails, um, uh.” I pointed to the sign and after a brief awkward moment told the waitress that Chloe reads. We all shared a relieved chuckle followed by deep belly laughs that come with the kind of shared moments that become inside jokes.

We oohed and awed at the gorgeous sunset while we ate our food. When I eat I sometimes daydream and could not help thinking of a shower. We do not have a water heater. Let's pause to consider this. In the morning and evening it is not particuarily hot here and a cold shower is a most affronting and daunting task. Taking a cold shower when you don't wish for one requires a certain amount of pep talk before hand. Little Engine on the count of three, one…two…three, GO! It is can be difficult to maneuver girlie tasks in a cold shower and sometimes I don't rinse all of the soap out of my hair in my haste of getting out and getting warm. We have a plastic tub for the kids that we top off with hot water from the stove so that their experience is less shocking. Being clean is worth the effort of two to three quick cold showers a day, but I will love a hot bubble bath that much more when I am reaquainted with it.

At Cupid's restaurant the service was great, the food good and the prices decent. Zach had a burger and fries, I had fresh fish (what else?) and the kids ate quesadillas. Everyone enjoyed their meals and we even treated the kids to a strawberry soda to ease any disappointment about not getting cocktails, and because family date night was a special occasion.

Struggling to get to dinner was a physical reminder that sometimes life’s treasures take hard work and perseverance. It is not always an uphill effort, but if we give all of ourselves, we get even more in return and we might even get to coast for a while. I will say that going back down the mountain was much easier that going up.






All in all, it was a good date to celebrate a great marriage.