It took me a little while to relax in truth, I couldn't help fidgeting on my sun bed, wondering what time it was at home and what I would be doing if I wasn't on my hols. But, helped along by the beating down sun (and a couple of cervessa) all my worries soon melted away. By day three my biggest concern was at which point I should turn over to toast my back.
I kicked off my holiday reading with a bit of a heavy one; Sally Brampton's memoir of her depression, entitled Shoot the Damn Dog. Yea I know, I did think that perhaps it wasn't such a good idea to read such a deep book when I was attempting to escape all that drama, but actually it was insightful and inspiring. I balanced the mood by then reading the obligatory holiday sex book. Pretty filthy to be honest. So filthy in fact that I read it in 24 hours.
I don't know what it is about the sun but it got me feeling a bit fruity (or was that just the sex book?). I soon found myself dreaming about the cute Spanish waiters at our favourite beach bar and the older man type who sat brooding, looking out to see unwinding with his red wine. It gave me plenty of writing material...
'I have been fantasizing a lot. I think it's a really good thing; my moody thinking time (well most of it) has been replaced by fantasy time. An indication of hope surely? Something I've definitely found difficult these past few months...
Fantasy number 1: the older man. A while ago I set myself the dating challenge of going out with three different guys, two of which I have achieved, the third remains unaccomplished. A date with Mr Older Man needs to happen. I've been finding myself imagining how sexy this could really be. Last night we had dinner in our new favourite bar on the beach and I couldn't help myself perving on this typically delicious older man type. He had longish, sunkissed hair, swept back with a bit of wet look gel. His skin was deeply tanned and weather beaten, his hands adorned with a few chunky gold rings and his wrists wrapped in a few worn leather bracelets. To top it all off, he was wearing a white linen shirt. The only thing missing were the keys to his yaht.
Fantasy number 2: the holiday romance aka sexy senora. You know this favourite beach bar of ours? Well not only are some of the clientele dreamy but the waiters are not too bad either. Spanish, knowing only a little English and dressed in white (probably linen, let's dream) to emphasise their natural tans. We have our favourite, we've nicknamed him the very unsexy name of Diego (desperately trying to think up a sexy Spanish alternative - failing, miserably). Anyway Diego has spotted us. Only on our second night drinking in the place he had remembered our drinks; 'Vodka con toniqua'. There was even a little flirt - he called me beautiful! This guy knows all the good English words...'Well, to let you into a little gossip, fantasy number two was realised only a few nights later. After some more flirting and broken conversation we bagged ourselves an invite to after hours cocktails on the beach with two of the sexy senoras. We very cooly agreed to hang about the bar for them to finish, passing the time with a couple more vodka con toniqua. Unsurprisingly we got pretty hammered. By the time they had finished we probably shouldn't have started on the cocktails but oh well, we were on holiday! They mixed us whatever we fancied (Mojito - naturally) and the four of us headed to the empty beach.
Cannot remember what the hell we talked about, but I do remember desperately trying to turn the flirt up with Diego. Turns out he speaks little to no English. Tricky I thought, but also pretty fucking hot. After another round of cocktails (and dodging of the invitation for a dip in the bar's pool) we headed back to the beach. This time his (uglier) friend appeared more interested and hell, I went along with it, I was on holiday after all, but to be honest, I have had better snogs in the corner of The Rose at closing on a Saturday night.
I woke up the next day with a pretty fucking horrendous hangover. I went back to sleep until 2:30pm then sweated the alcohol out of my body around the pool for the rest of the afternoon. By the time the evening came we were ready to return to our favourite joint and face the consequences. As I said to my oldest pal; 'Let's just go for the giggles'. Also I quite like these awkward situations. So we went for a last night dinner and to our relief it was all good. They even asked us to stick around for drinks that night too (yea sure they did, perhaps they thought they would get a little luckier than just a fumble on the beach).
I am determined not to break this holiday aura I seem to be sauntering around with. I'm even seriously thinking about booking another holiday with the girls in October (obviously I am going to have to sell something precious to pay for it; either my body or my car or both). Getting away from the daily grind (sorry for the cliche) has really helped me to see things much clearer. I'm not going to get bogged down by silly life stuff, the most important thing is to enjoy everyday and to do the things I love and to be with my friends and family. Works work, boys are boys; it's not the be all and end all. I plan to do crazy silly things when I get the opportunity to and hell, even live to regret a few things. Think of all the fun stories I will have to tell.
