The husband and I decided we would go away for the weekend just before Christmas. Which actually meant, I scoured the internet for a good ol’ European town to visit, booked the cheapest Easyjet flights possible, a nice hotel and ensured we had everything we needed for the trip. I make this quite clear to my friends now, because last time I sorted out a holiday for us two was to Egypt during Christmas, only for him to propose to me (which of course, I am not complaining about) but everyone thought he was so thoughtful and romantic by organising a holiday to Egypt OVER Christmas just to propose to me! Technically, he hijacked our holiday with a proposal. But really, I’m not complaining…
People overrate these ‘dirty’ weekends away. It adds pressure to just do the ‘dirty’, and not much else! The husband and I were really, just very happy to jump on a plane and go away somewhere relatively quiet and different to just spend some time together and switch off. We both work as teachers, and if you’re not familiar with deafness and the Christmas term, it is basically trying to keep up with a very noisy and very busy half term at 100mph. We obviously love our jobs, but like most deaf people working in a hearing world, we have to work twice as hard to listen, which often means we are burnt out by the end of the week, never mind the end of the half term.
As soon as we landed we hit the spa hotel, checked it out, had a nap (no joke, we were that tired!) and then hit the town for some much needed food. The first night was the best night. It felt like I was on a date with the husband, except we were totally relaxed, catching up properly, and cracking jokes (mostly me, followed by my cackling at my own joke) the rest of the stay was spent in the spa hotel, out in town exploring, eating and drinking. There was the gorgeous Christmas market on, where I bought the most comfortable woolly socks, ever. The shops were surprisingly good, we manged to scour a pair of boots for him, and a pair of jeans for me, for 120 euros altogether. Of course, we discovered that the spa hotel had a private VIP sauna room that you could hire… I guess we sneaked in a little bit of ‘dirty’ in the end!
It was very cold, but gave me all the more reasons to cuddle up and just talk. It reinforces my belief that communication is the key to most relationships surviving the distance. If you haven’t got communication I think everything just falls apart. I don’t know about other people, but I think deaf people know this more than most given how communication is such a crucial and important issue from the very beginning. Someone once told me that deaf people have the highest inter-racial (if that’s the right word) marriage rates ever. As in, compared to other people of the same race, deaf marry deaf more than any other people of the same race marrying each other. This includes for example a black deaf man marrying a white deaf woman, an asian deaf woman marrying a chinese deaf man and so on. I really must track this down. It doesn’t surprise me, if it is true, because communication is one of the true foundations of a good relationship.
I also must mention I got a bit pissed on the first night. After a fantastic meal, copious amounts of wine, and mulled wine from the Christmas market, it all came back up hours later. Damn it. Incase you’re wondering where we went, it was to Tallinn, Estonia. Well worth a visit, and maybe one of the last remaining European cities where everything is reasonably priced (especially the spa resort- it came to about 300 euros for 3 nights including breakfast and 4 spa treatments between us!)
I must say, the husband was very surprised I booked Tallinn, and even asked me with doubt if I realised it was very cold. As in, it’s colder than home, N Ireland. He knows too well I hate the cold, but I said I liked to explore new places. Needless to say, it was fricking cold. Very cold! But not to the point where I wasn’t enjoying myself. And that spa resort helped 
Surprisingly. Tallinn is the birthplace of Skype and are very forward in free wifi access all over the town. Why can’t London be like that? It seems to me Tallinn know how to get the simple things right. In London it seems like it has to go through hoop by obstacle through bureaucracy through loophole through dodgy business before it’s set up and not even working properly.
So, definitely going to book another weekend away sometime next summer, probably to Italy. We always look at the Easyjet magazine on our way back from a weekend away and decide where we’re going next. Italy is the target.
Now we’re back to near the end of January and we’re overworked again, but we have Estonian memories to hold onto until the next weekend away where we just ‘switch off’. I just wonder if we will be able to do this every weekend if we have kids….
