One Way to Miscommunicate in the Modern World

It has been kind of a tough winter in some ways and my daughter Carrie, who lives out in Northampton, Massachusetts, has been working very hard on school things and other things she is involved in at Greenfield Community College.  So I thought that we could both use a little breather and offered to take her to The Porches Inn in North Adams, Massachusetts, during her spring break.

So I texted her.  “When’s your spring break?” I asked. “You want to do an overnight at Porches?”

The Porches Inn is a great B&B in North Adams, Massachusetts, where we’ve stayed in the past.  AND it’s right across from the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art, a very cool place.

She texted me back, “18-24 (so like, week after next), I only have plans for 23^rd and 24^th.  That’d be great.”

I told her I’d check it out and check with Evan to see if he could stay with Olive, the pug.

So after a little back and forth, I got on the Mass MoCA website and determined they wouldn’t be open the day we would be there and that, anyway, The Porches Inn had no rooms available when we wanted to be there either sooooo…I asked her if she would like to do something else.  She said yes.

I put a figurative pin in the map and looked for someplace an hour and a half or so from here and decided that Salem would be fun and I found what looked like a very cool boutique hotel there called The Merchant and asked if I should book the night of the 18^th.

The Merchant, Salem Massachusetts

“Sure!  Sounds great,” she said with a smiley face.

So I got on line and booked us a nice king room with a sleeper sofa for the night of April 18.  We were all set.  Then I put it on my Google calendar and invited Carrie to okay it.   She declined.

I texted, “I got a message that you declined the trip to Salem on the 18^th of April.  I imagine it was just one of those Google glitches, because I don’t figure it means you don’t want to go.  Right?”

She texted back, “I just like having it set up in my way rather than via the invite.”

“Good,” I texted.

So last Saturday, the 17^th of March, I was at our church, The Brookfield Unitarian Universalist Church, working at our annual silent auction fundraiser.  At some point, I checked my phone and saw that I had a message from Carrie saying she didn’t know when she would be out because she was busy, so it might be in the morning.  Confused, I let her know that, of course, she could come out whenever she wanted to.

After a long night, I came home to find Carrie working on some calculus problem and because I was exhausted from the night’s work, I crashed on the couch.  Then I got curious.  Had Carrie come to visit for a reason that I had forgotten?  I remembered we had talked vaguely about going to see the movie Vertigo at the theater, but I didn’t think it was that.  So, thinking that it’s best to know when you’re unsure, I asked her why she was here.

“We’re going to Salem tomorrow,” she said a bit casually.  She didn't let on what she was thinking.

“What?  I thought we were going in April,” I countered.

“But this is my spring break,” she said.

Well, knock me over with a feather!  I screwed up.  In my mind, I thought she meant April and in her mind, she thought I had just been having a senior moment when I said April in my text.

Okay.  Long story short, I was able to change the reservation, Evan said he could watch the dog and off we went to Salem to The Merchant for a nice relaxing overnight on Sunday, March 18^th. 

Willingness to be flexible is a good thing when it comes to screwing up communications.  Had I noticed that Carrie had said “like week after next” this could have been avoided.  And if she had thought to question me on my April calendar entry, I could have made the changes sooner.  

Oh, well…  No worries.  It all worked out and we had a good time.

We were in Suite No. 1.  A room with real keys.

The view from our window

Instead of chocolates on the pillow, you get peppercorns at The Merchant together with a recipe for a Peppercorn Daquiri.

Ahhhh.....