Why Choose The Beach Over The City For Your Next Vacation

Many people enjoy the high culture of a city like New York, Shanghai, or Rome, but when I take a week off from work it's to relax. That means waking up late, eating omelets poolside and digging my toes in the sand.

Maybe it's because when I was younger my family had a timeshare at a Florida beachfront condo. We went down to Palm Beach every year during the winter and sometimes during the summer, although it was often too warm in August. But those days when we sat in the white sands and watched the turquoise waves stroke the beach were some of the best of my life.

Usually we went to the beach after Christmas but when I was twelve we left on Christmas eve. We had a nice dinner out on the town, overlooking the black ocean, listening to the cool waves. It all seems so distant now but if I remember hard enough, or try to (maybe it's my memory conflating different memories or my imagination stepping in to fill the gaps) we ate Mexican food and my parents had one too many margaritas. I remember them walking to the car and I thought, I can't believe they're kissing like that. It was the first time I remember looking at my parents from the outside, or maybe it was simply because I was twelve and all twelve year-olds are somewhat ashamed that they sprang from the loins of two people over whom they had no control of knowing before life. A funny age, twelve. Pre-pubescent. Or right on the cusp.

The next day was Christmas and the first thing we did upon waking was put on our bathing suits because we knew that we wouldn't have any presents until later in the morning. We walked across the crystal white beaches. There was a girl. She was beautiful: my age (she was probably a few years older, come to think of it), thin, pretty, brown hair. When she came out of the water she held her hands together over her breasts as though she were praying. Her hair scraggled over her ears, and a brown curl fell onto her neck. She shivered lightly. Or maybe I just like to imagine her shivering, needing someone to keep her warm. I wanted to say something to her, but we only smiled. She walked off the beach and I ran into the water with abandon hoping she was watching, hoping to impress her. I never saw her again.

So this year I'm going to take my family to the beach for Christmas. We're going to rent a Florida beachfront condo. We'll go to Rome next summer.

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