(Photo Credit: Kimona Paramour Photography)

The end of our trip to Tobago was amazing. It’s easy to be adventurous when your time is limited. I can  be up for anything with only 72 hours left to go. Until we have our plane tickets in hand for our next trip, which we hope to make in about a year, we can’t know for sure when we’ll be back.

Every chance we have to do something special needs to be grabbed and squeezed for all it’s worth. We can recover when we get home.

With that in mind, we stayed out till 3 a.m. at a soca concert at a nightclub on Tuesday night. These days, I would  never go to a nightclub in the States. In Tobago, with Carnival season just beginning, we were surrounded by people from young kids who looked like they were teenagers, to couples in their 50’s. It didn’t feel weird for us, in our mid-to-late 30’s, to be out at a club in the middle of the night. The hair! The clothes! Everyone looked amazing. People were greeting friends and old classmates. There was a great sense of being part of something.

The open-air club had a sea breeze coming through and the event was exhilarating and so fun. Two artists performed, Kes and Adana. Drinks were flowing. A DJ played in between and after the performances and we danced until we were nearly the last people there.

On Wednesday we went back to our waterfall, this time with our oldest in tow. It was an hour drive, which surprised me.

Last time, it was sunny and clear. This time, it had been raining all day. The trail was muddy and the falls were brown. We went into the water anyway (here’s our family pic from that day). It may have been dirty, but it was still refreshing, and the look on my son’s face made it doubly worth it.

We went out to eat. We went out to eat again. We picked up souvenirs. We got another beach sunset. We ate out again (We never eat out).

Our last night, we found out my brother-in-law would be DJ’ing TBT at a local bar. We got the kids to bed (our three year old hung on till after nine) and left the house at 10 p.m., knowing we had to be awake at 5 a.m. to catch our flight the next morning.

We sat at a little table outside the bar, sipping drinks and cringing as the Americans at the table next to us kept petting the stray dogs that wandered around outside the establishment. Colored lights glowed. We talked as the music played, and Cylon’s brother came out to say hello and talk a few times.

Finally, close to 2 a.m., we headed home.

A few hours later, we would get up, make our flight, catch a connecting flight, and continue traveling through to JFK, then drive to our house upstate – normally a three hour drive that took 6 because of traffic. We didn’t get home till 8 p.m. That part is all an unpleasant haze.

Now, my last bug bites are almost healed. My hands are dried and cracked again. Our kids are slowly working their way through the stomach bug we accidentally took back with us. All the suitcases are unpacked and most of the stuff is put away.

It almost doesn’t feel real. When I was under that waterfall, when I was dancing, when I was jumping waves, my depression wasn’t with me. I didn’t totally leave it behind, but I could get away from it when I was in Tobago. It feels harder to do that at home.

I hear you, Mary, when you talk about treasuring these things in your heart. That is exactly what I’m doing.