Chillin’ With the Chillen

My youngest son Tom is here for a few days by himself. Tom (a.k.a. Thomas) has been a regular and often visitor to Casa Moonstruck over the fourteen years we have owned this place. The hilltop and all its glorious views, weather and landscape seem to appeal to him just like they do to us. Now that Daughter Carolyn and her brood have spent three summers here (they have spent the month of July here in 2023, 2024 and 2025), I think its fair to say that she and her family feel the same way about our hilltop. I regret that my oldest son, Roger and his wife Valene have not come out for a visit in all that time, but he had other priorities and I am equally happy that he has gained purchase on those priorities and goals and that the “sacrifice” has been worthwhile in the all-important quest for personal fulfillment and life positioning. Perhaps now we can find a time and opportunity to get them out here to commune with our hilltop as my other kids have. I’ll consider that a personal objective for 2026 as well the continuation of the visitation plans for Tom and Carolyn.

When Carolyn and gang come for July, Kim and I (with engaged assist from Carolyn) are always spending time doing forward planning about how to balance all the activity desires of the crew with the combination of work continuity for son-in-law John, who spends a great deal of time out on the deck with multiple screens facing the ocean and stirring up the New York mortgage market, and the grandkids’ comfort at just hanging around the house on lazy summer days doing what young girls like to do in the summer…which is often nothing. Carolyn is a more energetic mom than most and is always planning activities. There is always a 3-day Disney visit, at least one stop at Old Town in San Diego, usually a day at either the Safari Park or San Diego Zoo, and probably another visit or two to some combination of Legoland, Seaworld and/or Balboa Park. We do a day on Coronado with perhaps a Spreckles Park evening concert/picnic in the park and certainly a meal at Hotel Del Coronado. We also make sure to spend at least one day at or near the beach, to give them a contrast to the fabulous white sands of Sun & Surf on Atlantic Beach on the sandbar of Long Island that Carolyn grew up with and is still her mother’s summer respite of choice. In addition, we always plan at least one special trip to somewhere different. We have done the Mojave and Anza Borego deserts, Las Vegas, Denver, the PCH, Hearst Castle, Solvang, Paso Robles, and about everywhere that I can think of. By my reckoning the things that are left are Death Valley and Baja, both with summertime challenges attached, but both still on the consideration list.

When Tom comes, and especially when he come by himself (as is the case this time, since his wife, Jenna, is with her family in Tel Aviv), he has a very different approach to spending his time on the hilltop. Tom has a need to unwind more than some and whenever he comes for a visit, he particularly likes to just chill. He and Jenna both travel a lot, both for business and personal reasons. Tom has had a very busy year, certainly by his standards, but also on an absolute basis. In addition to getting a new job a few months ago as the head of video production for the largest ad agency in Denver, he has continued to work for his ever-expanding independent client base. That means, for example, he had to fly to NYC last month and shoot footage a the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens to be used to promote their holiday light show. He tells me that he had produced hundreds of videos this year and edited over a hundred, which he says is a lot (I have no reason to understand what that volume means, but I have no reason to doubt what he says either). What I do know is that he really just wants to hang around the hilltop for these few spare end-of-year days, sleeping late, sitting on the deck enjoying the views and the mild weather, and eating whatever Kim has in the house and feels like making. It doesn’t sound like a very exciting visit, but its what he wants and it happens to fit in nicely with what Kim and I increasingly find ourselves doing as we settle into life on our hilltop.

Yes, we like traveling and making plans to travel (both longer international trips and short regional trips). Right now over the next four months we have one twelve-day international trips and two regional trips totaling eight days. That means out of 120 days, we have travel plans for 20 of those days (17%). That’s slightly down from our 2025 travel time of about 20% all totaled for the year. I’m proud of that trend since ZI’ve been saying for some time that we plan to travel less. The truth is that I suspect we will end the year with even less travel time as a percentage since we literally have nothing else planned yet for 2026. I’m sure things will come up, but we are increasingly comfortable just spending more time at home…especially if we can get the kids and other friends and family to come out and harness around the hilltop with us like Tom is doing now. am about to book a 4-day mini-cruise from L.A. to Ensenada, Mexico when Carolyn and the grandkids come out in July. It was something I looked into last year, but did so too late and got boxed out. I feel like I had to twist Carolyn’s arm a bit to agree to both a cruise and a Mexico destination, but I convinced her that it would be a good experience all around for the girls, so she agreed to it.

The appeal of the cruise has almost nothing to do with Mexico for me. I’ve spent many days in all different parts of Mexico over the years and while I thoroughly enjoy Mexico, I have no need to be a cruise ship tourist in Ensenada for a day. I do, however, always have time for chillin’ with the chillen. In fact, now that I’m thinking about it, and now that I know both Tom and Roger are unable to join us for that mini-cruise in July, I will probably lobby Kim for a trip in June or so to stop for a few days in Denver and a few days in Delaware to chill with the other chillen. Then, the only other trip I know we will make is in early December for our annual NYC Christmas visit for even more chillin’ with the chillen. What fills in around all that will be up to the fates and whatever whims inspire us to action…but I suspect that if we haven’t done any planning yet…it may not come to pass. But then again, we are chill with all that, aren’t we?