Happy Holidays

I got my first glimpse of how major holidays are celebrated on boats with the Fourth, which is to say, they kind of aren't. There were signs proclaiming, “Let Freedom Ring,” hanging in all of the restaurants and plenty of bunting, but other than that, the day kind of slipped by. I was hoping for an elaborate fireworks display shot off from the helipad, but maybe because of fire concerns (fire is the number one enemy on the sea, fyi) or that the majority of the crew are not US Citizens, such a display didn't happen.

But an exciting development did occur yesterday, nonetheless. Beth and I ran into the male counterpart of the ballroom dance couple last night, and he thanked us for coming to the show earlier in the evening. Beth has made huge progress with them in the past few weeks, befriending the female half to the point where she initiates conversations in the hallways and waves to us at the end of her show. Her husband, however, has been more reserved. He has shot Beth a lot of significant glances - raised eyebrows and smiles, she is clearly their favorite - during their shows, but up until this point we were not sure he even knew who we were. He is more the strong silent type, and I often think he would as soon beat the crap out of me as he would say hello. To give you a frame of reference, he does dips in the gym while clasping a twenty pound barbell between his legs; he hasn't struck me as the kind of guy who's into the funny ha-ha's. But last night he asked us a lot of questions about when our show is, and explained that he and his wife usually visit friends in Miami and so are tired when they get back, but that he would set his alarm to see our show on Wednesday. To the outside world, this might not seem like much. But in our small world, it as if the Berlin Wall has come down, and we anxiously await tomorrow's show to discover the reconfigured borders of our new country.