You Pay for This?

Last night I got a phone call from my son and daughter-in-law who are travelling in Maui with their two children and nanny (who is also my daughter-in-law's mother.) They had just been to view a sunrise from the top of a volcanoe which meant they all had to get up at 4 a.m. and drive 40 miles to an altitude of 10K feet. Apparently it sucked and she had a "massive headache and nausea." After raging at my son for having pressured them all to go at this hour the next thing they did was go for a frightening drive on a sometimes one-lane road along the cliffs by the ocean. It was beautiful but also terrifying. At the end of the drive they saw a rock with a natural-made hole in it where the ocean pressure sent a spume 50 ft. high! Is it worth it? Well, if you believe in "no pain, no gain" it certainly is. It seems, in life, there has to be some element of danger or hardship to make an experience worth mentioning. For instance, blogging, for married bloggers. It would be safer just to e-mail and not be afraid of exposing yourself but that wouldn't be as enjoyable as the vague fear that you might get scalded in letting off steam. And so it goes with vacations: I remember a trip to Disney World in 1984 with my daughter and son. We were on one of the "adventures": I think it was Exxon's "Wonderful World of Energy" and we were sitting in a huge dark hall on a moving bench which took you through the era of the dinosaurs and eons of time. All of a sudden the power was lost, the lights came on and we all had to walk dejectedly out an emergency exit. No fear, no pain; just the blahs. So, yes, I guess you can't have beauty and fear without paying for it. Besides, it really gives you a priceless talking point.