Member-only story
BAGGAGE
Hot Mess: Our Only Constant
On youth, Utila, and the heat
We are the Airbnb guests from hell.
Our 11-year-old is playing a game of Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride in the yard with the resident golf cart, his six-year-old brother hanging on for dear life in shotgun. Our nine-year-old threatens to cannonball all the water out of the pool.
One of the sculptural, dried-out conchs from the coffee table is in shards — we accidentally left the breezeway door open for the wind to sweep it to its death. Against our best intentions, we’ve cranked the A/C and soiled every towel by the second day here.
The ugliest of ugly Americans, we are the basest versions of ourselves.
It hasn’t always been bad. This trip is different from our other treks to Utila, and not just because I am fretting about the wet forecast for our brief time here and looking petulantly at my white legs. (Though the sun RSVP’d yes for this one, behind those clouds, se fue.)
The problem is our numbers. Not all of us Vogels made it to the island. The eight of us would have traveled together, to snorkel and dive as a family, until recently — my husband, Joe, and I, plus our five sons and daughter. But our oldest two sons couldn’t swing it this spring break. Conflicting school schedules, college…
