You went to the beach? Splendid. I love the beach. Fortunately, I was able to spend all June at my family’s house in Bermuda.
You read? Love it. Nothing beats a pleasant beach read. My favorite is Anna Karenina. I finished it over mojitos my first week in Bermuda.
You went camping? At Assateague Island? How nice! Camping is one of my favorites. I actually just spent two weeks at the base of the Grand Canyon. It’s so cool at the bottom that you don’t even need a Yeti cooler to keep your drinks chilled.
You visited Austin? So trendy. Austin’s one of my favorites. I stopped there for a weekend in July while road tripping to visit friends in Nashville, New Orleans, Austin, Boulder, Vegas, LA, Portland, Bozeman, Jackson Hole, Chicago, Brooklyn, Nantucket and Richmond. Oh and Charleston! I always forget Charleston.
You marched on Washington? Go you. I was there marching with Antifa a few weeks back. My daughter loathes Trump, so I organized a counter-protest against Unite the Right 2. By the time we all gathered on Lafayette Square, only about 40 Nazis showed up. I was expecting more fireworks, but it was still a wonderful birthday party.
You stayed home and relaxed? Oh, me too, friend. Get this, I paid an experimental physician to sedate me from Memorial Day to Labor Day so that I could retain the foundational bliss of sleep without actually resting all summer long. I feel great, and thanks to the tanning bed, I look it too!
Oh, you were too busy with work to relax? Tell me about it. They say working at the highest level of the CIA is a 24/7 job for a reason. Even when I say I’m on vacation or summering in Bermuda, I’m really working. Some leads just happen to take me to Charleston. What am I working on? I can’t tell you that; I’m not even supposed to tell you I work for the CIA. I trust that this discussion will remain between the two of us.
You ran a marathon? Impressive! How was it? I bet. The first five are always the hardest, then you move on to Ironmans. This summer I completed an UltraIronman. We started in Russia, where I told my boss I had to follow a lead, to swim across the Bering Strait. We immediately biked through Alaska afterwards, then ran to Seattle through Canada. It was grueling, but it was worth it for a picture at the finish line. Not to mention the free beer!
You saw ancient monuments? How old were they? Wow, 3,000 years really puts life into perspective doesn’t it? My husband and I recently took a helicopter into the jungles of Honduras, and—after some bartering—managed to visit the Lost City of the Monkey God. The ruins aren’t in great shape, in fact they weren’t even worth Instagramming. My husband quipped about how that’s what cities get when they don’t pay taxes for 5,000 years. Did you get any souvenirs? Too bad, I smuggled a cute monkey engraving. The man at Sotheby’s appraised it at $2 million, but you can't put a price tag on a memory, can you?
You visited Europe? Hurra! What was your favorite part? Florence? Omg yas. I studied watercolors there this month before deciding my time on the continent shouldn’t be constrained to the summer. I live in Cannes now. The kids weren’t thrilled to leave America one week before school—in fact they were even angrier than my boss, who really did not appreciate me “stealing an historically, culturally, and anthropologically significant artifact”—but they will change their tone when they see the coast and learn the language. I’m just happy to turn a new leaf. After all, isn’t that what fall is all about?