My dad started it…..my vacationing style I mean.

My first recollection of vacation was a trip to Denver. We made it late one afternoon and he pulled into the Ramada Inn Cherry Hills.  A very nice place by his thinking.  Probably over the family budget, but it was vacation!  Dad always said, “don’t look at the prices on the menu, it will only ruin the vacation”.  Mom, on the other hand, who was responsible for the checkbook and the bills, was always aware of the prices.  Another thing dad was famous for was not making reservations.  In 1968, Dad came home and said, “lets go to the Hemisphere”.  It was a huge event being held in San Antonio.  We arrived without reservations.  Dad pulled into the Hilton with mom sure he would never get us a room anywhere, much less at the central hotel of the entire fair.  He, of course walked out with a key.  I’m not sure how he did it, but it drove my mom crazy!!  We ate dinner on top of the Hemisphere tower that night.  Had my first shrimp cocktail that night.  I thought of Dad last night as I slopped a healthy dose of cocktail sauce on that jumbo shrimp!

Anyway, when I go on vacation, it’s gonna be fun.  Try new things.  Don’t look at the prices.  So yesterday I got a massage……and a facial.  Yes, a facial.  If you know me, you know that is a little, well, out of character for me.  But I figured, what the heck, I’m gonna give it a whirl!  The massage was great, then the facial.   It felt pretty good really, but then she put a peel off mask on me.  You know, they spread some sort of warm, plastic like concoction that dries hard, then she peels it off.  When the whole thing is finished she puts a mirror in your face and in some sort of Serbian accent, says, “can’t you see the glow (pause here)  the lightness?”  Well I just didn’t have the heart to tell her looked pretty much the same to me….56 year old guy that spent too much time in the sun.

Now to my point.  That facial made me think a little.  In life, we put all sorts of things on to cover up what we really look like (or really are).  We convince ourselves that it will work, but the truth is, it won’t.  I intend to use this trip to think about who I really am.  Who I really want to be.  Who God created me to be.  I’m gonna be looking for the peel off masks in my life.  I know that God is the only one/thing that can rejuvenate my skin or anything else for that matter.  But this is for sure.  He isn’t interested in the shallow parts of my life; to Him, beauty is not skin deep.  Looks like I’m in for a little DEEP TISSUE MASSAGE!