The last trip I took with my parents was in 2011. I was living in Sheffield and we went on a tour bus around the UK. Even a bit of Wales, but only Cardiff and that Llanfair place.

It was september, so we did get drenched in Glencoe, Aviemore, and in Skye. We had whisky. I had to do massive data crunch on Excel and I barely had any sleep due to work. There was an outbreak of Norovirus at the hotel in Edinburgh and I was scared that they were going to get it and not survive.

I was the one who caught it. And I thought I wasn’t going to make it. Thankfully it only lasted for 48 hours or so. It never got too bad as I couldn’t walk, but I had too many close calls with the loo.

I had this feeling during the trip that it was the last one together. I’m a well known pessimist and too many things went wrong on that trip. We were supposed to go to Liverpool, but everything was closed due to protests, so we ended up in Manchester. I forgot the adapters and we scrambled all the time for a Wilkinson’s or a Curry’s, to no avail. I wanted chips in Glastonbury, near the magnificent ruins and my dad insisted on getting fish too. It was too hot and we had to scramble to the bus. Shame to leave more than half, it was delicious and freshly made.

When I think of that trip, a feeling of sadness comes, because I wish we had an opportunity for another trip, but as eventful as this was, I appreciate the photos we took, the drinks we had, the starry nights in Plymouth, Exeter, and the Dartmoor Inn in Merrivale where they only served doombar and you could see the milky way.

We specially had a great time in Bath. We had sausages on the street, my mum had a 99p flake, a street musician was playing the pan drums, and we walked on the Roman baths, letting millenia old history drenched us. I kept thinking about Thrice’s Night Diving, a song that is both melancholic and joyful.

After my dad passed away in 2020, I was clearing his desk and found the first notes of an autobiography he was writing. He didn’t advance much, and only one bit caught my eye. In just three lines, he captured how he proposed to my mother in Laguna del Carpintero in Tampico. Nothing fancy, just true love by the shore. I instantly thought about night diving by Thrice again.

Today, April 23rd, would’ve been my parents’ 60th anniversary. They had fun during their 50th, and whatever happens after we’re gone, I hope they are now reunited, with all their loved pets, together forever, chilling by the shore.

-Sam J. Valdés López