OFF TO THE RACES

My family has been going to Saratoga for my entire life. The tradition started way before I was born and honestly, it’s probably one of, if not the, biggest component of all of our lives. When you have a family as spread out as mine, Saratoga was always the perfect opportunity for reunions. Whether it be all of my extended family or just my parents and me, there is no such thing as a bad day at the track. Well, in regards to family, betting is a whole other story.

As many of you know, me leaving New Jersey was partially inspired by my parents moving to upstate New York. Had they not taken a leap of faith, I’d probably still be sitting in my old cubicle and crying in the bathroom during my lunch breaks. However, with me moving to Washington D.C., I’m now four hours further from my parents. That makes the grand total seven hours of driving time. Not bad. Not great. But doable! So when I got the invitation (aka text from my mom) to come to Saratoga this summer, I wasn’t going to let any amount of distance get in my way of my family, the track and blowing all of my money on funny horse names.

The exciting part about planning this trip was that Pat’s family was coming too! This has never happened before. I’ve never had a boyfriend’s family come on “vacation” with my family, especially to a place that means so much to me. In fact, I don’t think any of my sisters have ever brought a boyfriend’s family to Saratoga. So needless to say, I was pretty nervous about the weekend…which is funny because I know my family and Pat’s very well so I knew nothing was going to go wrong, but still, I’m human and worry from time to time. Sue me.

All last week, I was so excited. I couldn’t wait for Friday to come around. I didn’t even care that I was going to be driving fourteen hours round trip, I just wanted to be surrounded by family. I needed my parents. It had been way too long since I’d seen them and we had lots to catch up on. So when Friday finally came, I rushed home on the metro, packed up my car and headed towards I-95.

I’ll spare you the details about how leaving a major city at 5:30 PM on a Friday is HORRIBLE. I’ll also spare you the count on how many curse words I said while being in bumper to bumper traffic on the New Jersey turnpike. Alas, I eventually made it to New York and was greeted by my sister yelling my name across the hotel lobby. At 12:30 AM. No thanks. I love you. But goodnight. By the time my head hit the pillow, it was 1:00 AM and all I wanted to do was sleep. Too bad I had a 7:30 AM alarm set for the following morning.

It didn’t matter though if I had gotten two hours of sleep or almost a full night’s rest, my adrenaline had fully kicked in because it was TRACK DAY. I got ready, enjoyed a nice breakfast with Pat and his family and we were off to Saratoga. Before we could get to my parent’s house, we needed alcohol. Oh boy, what a treat that was. Did you know that you can’t even touch alcohol in a store without your license on you in New York? Yeah, Pat learned the hard way with that one. Even though I had my license, Pat putting the beer on the counter resulted in me only getting to buy ice and calling a woman a not so nice name for being incredibly condensing and rude. KMA Stewart’s cashier lady. Also, you can look up KMA after you read the rest of my blog post. It’s aggressive, but fitting.

By the time we got to the track and set up our area, it was just about time for the first race. From then on, the entire day went by way too fast. There were eleven races and by the time the last race went off, it felt like I had just blinked and the day was over. Between betting, practicing my photography skills and enjoying a few cold ones, time truly was flying. It didn’t even matter that it rained all day, I was still incredibly sad to leave. I had my cousin, her husband, their son (aka my adorable and perfect second cousin), aunt, uncles, family friends, boyfriend and his family, my soon to be brother-in-law and my family all there. What more could I have asked for?! Well, winning some races would’ve been nice. Regardless though, it was just such a great day and made me really wish that I had considered moving closer to my parents than further away.

I had a lot of time to think on my drive home that next day. I was so sad to say goodbye, but I realized that it’s because I’m still in that crutch stage with some people. I note that it’s a singular crutch because I can walk on my own, but I still need support from my inner circle. I need to know that I can get to them when I need to, but can walk on my own as well. My parents especially are a crutch. We haven’t always had the best relationships, but such is life. Now that I have a strong bond with both of them, I never want to let that go. They inspired me to make this life change and have never doubted my ability to handle it. So yes, it’s extremely hard not being able to just pop over and have dinner with them. I’ll always miss those days and I wish I hadn’t taken them for granted. But now that I live seven hours away, time with them matters more and I’m going to make sure I continue to remember and commit to that.

HEADS UP: If you’re interested in checking out some photos from my trip, checkout my Saratoga, New York post.