THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, June 18, 1995 TAG: 9506150201
SECTION: CAROLINA COAST PAGE: 50 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Editorial
SOURCE: Ron Speer
LENGTH: Medium: 74 lines
You know it's time to take a break and get away from it all when you:
Straggle home at 9 p.m. and give your spouse the devil because supper's cold.
Invite friends in for dinner and as soon as they've finished eating, tell them you're tired and order them out of the house at 10 o'clock.
Decide that all those people squabbling over turf during planning meetings for hurricane preparedness really are concerned only about doing what's best for us all during a disaster.
Catch yourself watching the O.J. Simpson show.
Snarl about the crowds of summer on the Outer Banks, forgetting that those good folks who bring money enable the rest of us to live here year-round.
Reply to a call from a long-lost friend come to visit that you're tied up and won't be home tonight.
Catch yourself wishing for ``the good old days,'' which really weren't that good for many of us.
Complain about how much work it is to pick the succulent meat from a steamed crab, letting your laziness keep you from enjoying one of the great delights of Outer Banks life.
Realize that high school speakers across the nation are quoting Forrest Gump as a great philosopher.
Wish that the outsiders and insiders fighting at county commission meetings would just shut up.
Start listening to talk shows, nodding in agreement with the paranoid callers who ain't ever happy about anything.
Find yourself staying silent - in apparent agreement - when some Neanderthal makes an outrageous claim about another religion or race.
Realize you haven't read a new book for weeks.
Discover that you have yet to drop a hook in the sound or the sea when there's been a bountiful run of fish up and down the Banks.
Decide that you'd rather spend the afternoon on the couch when the Wind Gypsy is straining at her lines, eager to spread her sails in the spring breezes and scoot around the sounds.
Realize that you've yet to stroll the beaches this year to see if anybody really wears those swimsuits pictured in Sports Illustrated.
Forget to send a thank-you card to a treasured friend who did something special for you.
Start laughing at those ads on the vacation channel by R.V. and The Sands lady and other restaurateurs.
Personally, I knew I'd reached the breaking point when I dreamed last week that I had been named principal of Manteo High School while continuing to serve as a newspaper editor. I was getting by until they started parading the troublemakers before me, insisting that I straighten them out immediately. My heart was pounding when decision after decision was demanded. I was trembling when I awoke, and delighted that all I actually had to do was handle newspaper problems.
So I'm out of here for a few days, heading back to my roots in the Sand Hills of Nebraska for my 44th class reunion. I've never been to a reunion in Hay Springs, population 600. And I haven't seen my oldest friends for nearly 20 years.
Not since I left there in '77 have I drunk a red beer (two-thirds of a glass of tap, one-third tomato juice), so I'll quench that thirst quickly with my cowboy friends. I'll swim in the Niobrara River, which in Sioux means Running Water, where Crazy Horse reigned until he was killed when he rode up to Fort Robinson ``to make peace.''
And I'll do a lot of other folksy things so that when I return in a week I'll be refreshed and ready to go when I settle in at our new digs at 2224 S. Croatan Highway, in front of the bowling alley in Nags Head.
The first thing I plan to do is go pier fishing, where I can wet a line and check out those swimsuits at the same time. by CNB