So if you read my blog yesterday then you know that this trip was hard for us. If we could have went back in time to change things, we would have never booked the cruise. And despite my scary sad visions and anxiety over leaving sick kiddos, we did it. We left. We arrived in Miami around 12:30 on Thursday afternoon. Right away we found a driver, actually he found us, and we got in his giant, somewhat scary white van (I have a fear of giant white vans but this one had windows so I got in) and made our way to the cruise ship. He dropped us off and we headed over to the luggage guy who asked for our passports. We didn't brings ours...they were expired and passports were not required for this particular cruise. He then asked for our birth certificates. What? We don't have those either. My visual wrath was turned directly to my other half whom I had asked at least THREE times if we needed our birth certificates...including right before we walked out the door on d-day. I am a detail person, he is not, this part of the trip was his baby. That's all I'm saying. The luggage guy was less than kind about our response and sent us to stand in a long line with our bags to talk to another friendly lady. I was in disbelief...this couldn't be happening...or perhaps my vision was legit and God was doing everything in His power to keep us off that boat. Did I mention our ship was named "Destiny"? So many emotions...so much stress. One lady lead us to another, then another, and another...we ended up sitting in an area with several other people who were not yet grown ups either, or who didn't speak English (everyone but us). They told us we could get a copy of our birth certificates faxed to Carnival, or even have someone take a picture of them and text it to us which we would e-mail to Carnival. Okay...there's hope. I called my beloved sister who was home with our three crazies. I told her to look in our safe box...she couldn't find them, a black folder full of adoption ppwk, nope, a bag in the closet full of adoption ppwk, nope, I was getting ready to send her to the next possible location when the sound of my sick children crying in the background forced me off the phone. I told her to take care of them and I'd call her back. Next option...JT and I both called our moms. My mom wasn't home...40 minutes away from home actually, but she had a copy and was going to rush home to get it. JT's mom was at work and she didn't think she still had one. Okay...at this point I was praying for another type of vision...one where I could see exactly where those birth certificates were...I was going crazy. What else, what else...I told JT to call our adoption agency and I would call our county Department of Child Services and see if either of those places had copies. I wasn't sure but thought maybe we had to have them when we went through the adoption process or when we became licensed foster parents. The adoption agency was no help...but my amazing friend at DCS was on it. I'll never forget her words "yeah, you had to have those. Let me grab your file and I'll fax it right away". And that's exactly what she did. There you have it, we were a 'go'. We had decided against our anxiety and fears to go on this trip, flew to Miami, and we were getting on the ship after a dramatic 2 hours of limbo. Some of our other friends sitting in the 'we forgot our proof of citizenship' area were not so lucky and I was sad for them. I guess it happens every cruise...some excited vacationers make this mistake and are very disappointed.
But we were on our way...out to sea...on a ship named Destiny.
We had to turn around two hours into the cruise and head back to Miami because one of the singer/dancers was seriously ill and needed what they called "stateside care". So our 1st port in Key West was canceled due to our delay and a shortage on time. Oh well...no worries from these two Crooks, we were just happy to be on the cruise:) I've got more to tell but my blogging time has expired...we really did have a good time. So glad my husband is a rational man and he didn't let my worrisome weirdness thwart our plans to celebrate a decade of wedded bliss! To be continued...
~A Cruisin Mama Crook
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