Abrigada for your stay

I am in Portugal, staying for five days at the five diamond resort in the Algarve.  I opened a small bottle of white from the mini bar, ordered the chicken from room service, took a bath in a massive tub.

You're always with yourself, no matter where you are.  I feel like I should be out socializing, mixing with the Hilton bigwigs.  I feel like the shy, dorky kid still.  I awoke early, went for run, worked for a few hours this morning, then went shopping for souvenirs, then finally allowed myself to sneak down to the pool for an hour or so.

And I walked down the path to the pool, up comes the spa director, the Hilton Conrad point person, and then the All-Hilton spa person.  Big, big, big.  And there's me, probably looking messy and sweaty with a bad tattoo showing.

I don't think they noticed me.

I like my solo time. I am listening to Portuguese radio, drinking vino verde.

I want a support network of others that travel for work.  It's a different life.  Always going, streamlining the process (yes to bose headphones), away, leading a different life than your partner.  Flights delays, jetlag, weird food, constipation, crazy skin, searching for wifi, walking down unknown streets searching for a convenience store in which to purchase a corkscrew,  not posting to fb, eyeing the stranger at the hotel bar, BBC and Al-Jazeera, jetlag, should I order a meal, compression socks, friends with the bartender, small change ones and fives on hand, duty-free makeup, I want a cigarette, febreze travel size, economy plus is worth it, no one has a real camera anymore, this is out of my control, what's the worst that can happen.