Wherein my travel agent and I misunderstand each other

So John and I are going on our honeymoon in a few days, now that I’ve finished up those pesky exams I’ve been working on. We are going to “The Islands.” We hear there are beaches there. We find this exciting.

If I seem a little vague on the details, this is because I don’t really know any details. In a total break from our normal pattern, we have allowed this trip to be planned almost entirely by a nice woman named Leslie who works for a travel agency. (Yeah, I didn’t know travel agencies existed any more either.) You see, as an incredibly nice wedding gift, some family members made generous contributions to what we’re affectionately calling “the honeymoon fund,” (because “the fund that we probably should use to pay off student loans instead” was too depressing, and also too long.) These contributions are making it possible for us to allow Leslie to plan a nice trip to The Islands for us, where all we have to do is pretty much throw some flip flops in a bag and show up at the airport.1

So it is that I came to have the following conversation with Leslie today:

Pseudostoops: So, I’m calling to discuss some of the details of our honeymoon. Like, for example, what part of The Islands, specifically, we are headed to. Leslie: Oh, you are going to love it. You’re going to fly into St. Maarten, and then get a cab and take it to the marina, and then you’ll take a boat to Anguilla, where you’ll be staying. Pseudostoops: great. And that’s pretty straightforward? These are small islands, I assume. Leslie: Yes. And wear comfortable clothes, because once you get there, you’re in the islands. Pseudostoops: okay Leslie: and I should warn you, St. Maarten, well after the hurricanes, well, the French really never got their money back in there fast enough, and you might see some litter, and it’s a little funky, and (whispering now,) there’s some poverty there, (resume normal voice) so you’ll want to be sure to wear comfortable clothes… Pseudostoops: (thinking: oh no! not poverty! I think my honeymoon might be ruined if I were forced to confront the fact that there are POOR PEOPLE in The Islands!.) Right, okay. Leslie: but once you get to Anguilla, you’ll feel so relieved, it’s really well kept, and the locals are really well groomed, and you won’t see any poverty at all. Really, you’ll be able to totally forget the whole St. Maarten thing. Pseudostoops: [blink blink.]

I won’t even get into the part of the conversation where she told me, helpfully, that “drinking and driving is really frowned upon in The Islands.” Geez, that’s revelatory. I’ll have to be sure to write that down.

Regardless, it seems like Leslie’s got it all figured out, and I’m pretty psyched to sit on a beach and read non-law-related books for a week, so I have no complaints. I just hope John and I won’t feel hopefully out of place on our own honeymoon. 2

1. This is a marked departure from my normal model of travel, as illustrated by my recent trip to Boston, wherein I arrived at the Manchester New Hampshire airport at 11, had lunch plans in Andover at noon, and really had no way to get from the one to the other until I convinced a nice woman named Lily that perhaps, just for today, she would like to run a gypsy cab service and give me a ride.

2. I mean, around the well groomed locals. Because I am not all that well-groomed. Especially on vacation.

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