Once again, tonight finds me in the pool area, facing the ocean, but because there are dunes between the ocean and me, not to mention endless palm trees, I can’t see the ocean.  The moon is darn near full, if not full. It shines through the palm trees I face as I write. I hear splashing in the pool behind me, which I must admit baffles me how ANYONE could swim in these cool temps?  Even me who never denies herself a swim!  Perhaps I am becoming a wimp these days.

Yesterday we did Disney.   I opted for Disney “Hollywood Studios”, as I’ve never done that theme park of Disney’s array of theme parks in Orlando.  The beginning of the day was beyond awful!  Poor Dell, and poor me. We see things so differently and I think we are getting on one another’s nerves.  The trip to Orlando from where we are staying wasn’t all that pleasant. I continue to try to be quiet spirited and kind, but I fail miserably sometimes.  Dell finally said, “Can we just start the day over again?”  I agreed, and both of us seemed to try to be more patient of the other.  It did make a difference.

The park was SO, SO, SO crowded! You could hardly move!!  The rides were waits of over 2 hours in most cases, and to try to even grab something to eat was impossible with lines that backed way up!  I wasn’t very happy. I’m not one that likes crowded places. I text messaged both Jane and Elizabeth,  stressing my disappointment!  Not to mention Florida didn’t go unscathed with this latest cold front that moved through the country!  It was a high of 65 with high winds!  But with all those people, I couldn’t figure out if I was hot or cold.  Rumor had it from one of the employees late last night that yesterday was the 2^nd highest day since the Studio Park opened back in 80 something.  I believed the rumor, I was living it!

Amy called sometime during the late afternoon.  She and Chad had been to this studio park back in February.  I grumbled to her there was nothing to do!  She said, “MOM!  Did you do this and this?”  With all the people, we could hardly find our way around.  She got me a bit more excited, and I realized I had hardly had anything to eat!  After she told me what to do, we decided to try to find something “nice” to eat.  All the “nice” restaurants were sold out, some people having had reservations at the nicer restaurants within the park for months! But some girl felt sorry for us, got on the computer and got us a reservation in the next 10 minutes at the Sci Fi Café.  We rushed to find this place, and that was when things began to turn around.  The café was AWESOME!  The whole place was a replica of an old-fashioned drive-in theater.  You actually eat in a 58 convertible Chevy that has tables built in!  You watch 50s horror films, like “It Came From Outer Space!” and all those old monster movies! (I’d post a photo, but will have to do that when I get home. The resort internet is HORRIB LE! It’s extremely slow and I can’t get photos to upload on photobucket.)  We had a wonderful time at dinner, meeting some people who shared our car with us, we were in the back seat, they were in the front.  We LOVED this!  From there I took Amy’s advice and rode some of the things she suggested.  The park also has “American Idol” where actual people visiting the park audition throughout the day, and a grand finale is held at 7:00pm of all those that qualified throughout shows during the day.  The winner at Disney gets to audition for the actual show without going through the normal prelims!  It was REALLY exciting since the audience gets to do all the voting. We caught the grand finale and had a WONDERFUL time!  By the time the show was over the crowds were very thinned out!  It was really cold last night, but this didn’t bother me any!  We were able to ride all we wanted to, see the shows I wanted to see, and no longer had to fight crowds!  The park was to close at 10:00pm. At 9:30pm I had discovered the Disney Animation department, where they take you through and show you how animation for cartoons are done.  I got SO lucky!  There was ONE more art class that was held at 10:00pm!  I  was able to get into it!  I LOVED this!  For 45 minutes I sat at an actual Disney drawing table where an instructor taught those of us in the class how to draw Mickey Mouse!  The class didn’t let out till 10:45!  The park was well closed by now, Dell and I were one of the last stragglers out, we’d been there for 11 hours!  We still had to drive over an hour to get back to our beach resort……………..Dell exhausted, I took the challenge and drove late into the night. I was still flying high from my art class!  Why did I love this so much?  Okay…………CONFESSION!!!

“One of my dream jobs has always been to work at Disney.  From my younger days I always wanted to be an official part of the staff.  I never had the guts or opportunity to pursue it, so I guess being behind the scenes, and drawing as I did last night for a moment felt quite, “when you wish upon a star” to me.”

And my drive home was consumed with thoughts that for just a few minutes, I got to be there doing this.  I brought my drawing of Mickey home with me, rolled up and rubber banded, I am seriously considering framing it!  LOL.

I was  on my feet walking for almost 9 of the 11 hours!  Today my feet hurt!  It didn’t matter tho, as today was a beach day!

I was on the beach from 11:00am  - 3:00pm.  The temps were still cool, around 68, but the sun was out the whole day with not a cloud in the sky, and the winds had died down, there was just that normal ocean breeze floating in. For me, it was almost PERFECT on the beach!  A bit cool, so I never felt overheated.  Tonight, I have good color, perhaps a bit burned, but not bad.

We found a wonderful seafood place for dinner where deep sea fishing boats come in and out of.  The pelicans were EVERYWHERE trying to get bits and pieces of fish the fisherman throw to them!  (BTW…………the pelican is my favorite bird!)  I was SO close to them tonight!  I took some awesome pictures of them!  I talked to a bunch of them, and took their pictures. Yeah, I’m a bit weird talking to the birds, but who cares?  They almost posed for me, and when I can post pictures, you will see what I mean!  After that Dell wanted to go out on the beach by the restaurant and smoke a cigar.  I rolled my eyes, but who am I to question what HE wants to do on his vacation?  It meant more time for me to walk the beach and be still while he smoked that icky thing.  Please don’t ask me what he is going through as I have NO idea!  Cigars??????????????  He had stopped at some cigar shop on the way to dinner while I sat in the car and played my game on my cell phone.  So for all that are thinking we are having some sort of romantic vacation…………um, think again.  Things are NOT always as they seem!  I think we are more like brother and sister away on vacation, fighting, bickering, and getting on each other’s nerves.  *rolls eyes*  The good part of that is at least we respect one another that we give the other space to do their thing, like me always being on the beach, and by the pool at night to write. While he watches all the TV he can, drinks beer, and smokes cigars.  What are vacations for?

I SO want to go out on the beach after I write here, especially with the moon just almost full…………………..but my feet hurt SO bad after yesterday, and after all the sun today I am wiped out, so I think for me, it will be a very early bedtime, like 10:00-10:30.   If I do that I can be up at 7:00 and walk the beach as I have longed to do since I’ve been here, and NOT yet accomplished early in the morning.

Perhaps I have such peace about where I am at the moment.  Having discovered answers to so many questions I had for the longest time on this free-spirited get-away, I’m more in the mood to be grateful.  I’m still touched beyond belief that in all this discovery, Soul Mate seemed to fall right into the perfect timing of it all by sending me the message he did right before I arrived here at this beach.  And the awesome thing about it is I haven’t been all giddy and made it mean something it probably didn’t mean………….I’ve made it what I know in my heart.  He still thinks of me, as I still think of him, and between us, there is something very special. In a world where for now it appears it can’t be what I probably dream of it to be, (as I sit under the full moon, palm trees, and the beach just feet away)……………it still is something that remains very special for 2 complete strangers whose paths happened to cross in life, where I think we both recognized one another from another place, another time.  In my heart I know it’s true, and I think in his heart, I finally have come to accept, he knows it too.  I now have such peace and am ready to just follow this path that God has begun to birth in my spirit.  It’s going to be incredible when it all plays out the way I believe God showed me on the beach in Charleston it would be one day. Funny, He was able to show me the meaning of it all only when I finally gave it ALL back to Him………………….

So much more to come! 

As the faith, love, and light will lead me on.

Goodnight,

Sunshine

Goodnight Soul Mate:  By the way, did I happen to say thank you?  I have thought for a couple days how special it was that you sent that message to me and I hold it so dearly in my heart.  It really was a very sweet thing to do and I don’t take it for granted.  It gives me yet another memory to bury in my heart of some really awesome things you have done for me over the years.  Soon, I believe you will be honored when you see all that God had planned out of this journey that couldn’t be explained. I promise, there will be nothing asked of you, but I do believe you will one day understand, as I do now, why we were meant to meet and how beautiful of a plan it was in the end.  If that seems cryptic, sorry……………just know other than you and me and a VERY few select people, no one will know who Chris Matthews really is………………and I promise, you will always remain so very anonymous……………my promise to you because you are the inspiration behind the story.  Always have been, always well be, because my friend, you are truly a very special someone.  What a plan!  I send you love and light under the full moon shining through a palm tree……………….I wish you were here, only that wish needs to be in another place, another time for I honor your life where it is.  Goodnight,  Love, ~Sunshine