Orlando

IMPORTANT LETTER FROM ELBA ANNOUNCEMENT:  Now hear this.  After a year of writing you twice a week, Ellen Ross is going on vacay.  She will return with a brand-new post on Sunday, August 18.  (If you get lonesome, you can always go back to the archives and read some of the older posts.  Think of them as my “greatest hits” medley.)

This post is dedicated to Andi and Michael Shindler.  Just when you think you know all the fascinating people in the world, you meet this wonderful couple.  Because you asked, guys…

When Natasha and Nick were twelve and ten, over spring break, we headed for Disney World in Orlando.  The beautiful Hyatt Grand Cypress was going to be the Ross home-from-home for a week.

We flew down to Florida as scheduled.  But that was the only part of the trip that went as expected.  From the moment of check-in, the entire vacation took on a strange life of its own.

The hotel did not disappoint.  It was lavish and beautiful.  But the lobby seemed to have broken out in gingham.  Virtually everywhere I looked, people were dressed in red checkerboard.  And I mean everyone. I had to ask.

“Why is everyone in red checkerboard clothing?  What’s up?  A costume party?” I asked the front desk clerk.

“No, Madam.  Our entire hotel has been taken over by a Ralston-Purina convention.  I have been informed that most of our guests are prize-winners.  Because each is the largest distributor of hog, cattle and horse feed in their respective area, they are being treated to a week at the Grand Cypress on R-P.”

Well that explained the red-checkered bib overalls and dresses and straw hats.  Every where you turned, it was a giant hoedown.  And thus the hotel’s 800 plus rooms (thanks for this data, Michael) were now overrun with feedlot feeders.

All except the digs that held the Ross family.

But so what?  We were going to be doing lots of fun things en famille, and I didn’t care that we were the only full-paying guests in the entire hotel.

“Okay, kids, let’s get unpacked and head over to the Magic Kingdom.”

We whiled away the remaining part of the day at the land that Disney so lucrativly developed.  It was just okay.  The kids, who had loved Disneyland when they were younger, were now bored and not into the Mickey Mouse experience.  Ditto Epcot.  Big yawns all around.  They were now too grown-up or too jaded or too interactive. They wanted hands-on fun.

Ditto their father.

And the very next day they all found it.

On the grounds of the Grand Cypress, the Queen’s former son-in-law, Mark Phillips, had built a state-of-the-art riding academy.  Natasha had been an avid rider for years, and when they introduced her to a fairy tale white pony and set her on the jumps course, “Say ‘good night’, Gracie.”

I never saw her again during daylight hours for the rest of the trip.  Her every waking moment was spent at Mark Phillip’s (aka “Fog” because he was so wet and thick) equestrian center.  She only quit when they locked up that poor pony for bed rest each night.

My then husband, an avid golfer, had also been busy- making tee times at all the hard-to-get-on and you-have-to-know-someone golf courses in the Orlando area.  Every morning, bright and early, he would grab the car or a cart, and he wouldn’t return to the family vacation until the nineteenth hole had been soundly drunk to.

Nick, meanwhile, had discovered the grotto by the pool area.  It was filled with video games and at ten years old, he had that monkey squarely on his back.

So, armed with twenty-five dollars in quarters, (a bargain compared to the per diem cost of Fog’s horsey venture or my Sam Sneed wannabe’s green’s fees) he would disappear into the grotto’s maw and not come out again until his loot was used up.

Around five o’clock, Nick would emerge, blinking in the harsh Florida sunlight- his skin paler than the day before.

That left only yours truly to fend for herself at the pool.  And it was going to be slim pickings around there conversation-wise.

As I mentioned, the hotel was overrun with rural types.  (Once I stepped into the elevator and found myself staring at two full-grown, corn-fed adults astride red and white checked hobby horses.  The effect was breathtaking.)

But I bravely soldiered on.  I found a likely spot, staked out my chaise and then jumped into the water for a dip.  That Florida sun was hot.

I was lolling around when a nice-looking, older woman waded up to me.  We exchanged hellos and first names.  Her’s was Marie.

“Are you with the Ralston-Purina convention, Marie?” I asked politely.

(True her bathing suit was not red checkerboard, but at this point one could never be sure.)

“Heavens, no!” she exclaimed.  “My husband works for the New York Times.”

Yes!  She shoots, she scores!

The vacation gods were smiling down on me after all.  As a columnist- and would-be contributor- the New York Times was the Mt. Everest of my literary aspirations.  And I had just been handed Mrs. Tenzing Norgay on a pu pu platter.

But caution had to be my watchword.  I would have to cultivate this beauty of a career opportunity and take it slow.  Her husband was nowhere in evidence, but she was going to become my new BFF.

And so for the next four days I used misdirection and and charm and guile and wooed her non-stop. And never once did I mention her husband- and what I had deduced to be his plum job spearheading the NYT editorial board.

We talked about children and running a household and the woes of being a golf widow. Her hubby loved the game, too, of course.  (Every big shot was usually a slave to the links, I found.)

And every day from ten to four I was charming, entertaining, concerned and empathetic. And never once did I take my eye off the goal.  Meeting her Arthur Krock of a spouse.

I knew my big break had come.  Bless you, Orlando.

The last day dawned.  My big chance and I wasn’t going to blow it.

I saw Natasha off, on her way to the equitation center for the last time to bid a teary farewell to “her” pony.  I handed Nick his daily allotment of grotto-bound quarters.  My husband was already long disappeared to play a final eighteen on some glistening green sward somewhere in south Florida.  It was all up to me now.

I scampered down to the pool.  There she was waiting for me.

It was zero light thirty.

“It’s our last day, Marie, “I said.  “We’re going home this afternoon.  May I ask you a question?”

She nodded eagerly.

“What exactly does your husband do at the New York Times?  What’s his position there?”

“Oh, didn’t I tell you?  He drives a delivery truck.  But not for much longer.  This vacation is a retirement gift from our kids.”

Oh.

There was, however, one long-lasting effect of our trip to Orlando.  When Natasha got home, I bought her a pony.

I dubbed him Napoleon.

And I bet his feed was made by Ralston-Purina.

See you on August eighteenth, my friends.

And, as ever, thanks for reading.

Your pal, Ellen