{"id":1736,"date":"2026-05-22T11:01:29","date_gmt":"2026-05-22T11:01:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/?p=1736"},"modified":"2026-05-24T16:33:44","modified_gmt":"2026-05-24T16:33:44","slug":"escape","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/?p=1736","title":{"rendered":"Escape"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
Work lets me off at Noon!
It's their 3-day holiday weekend gift to us.
I could get used to this place.
I wrap up my duties by one, close the lid.

Push out of my chair, 
take numb legs for a stroll 
through the house.

Gather my bearings as a 
newly free human 
with hours on my side.

Crawl in bed and watch 
the last two episodes 
of BEEF<\/em>, limited series, 
first season.

The plot, the sound effects
the dialogue, the sets, the costumes.
The wondering in the desert.
The melding of realities and fates.
The inescapability of karma.
It's thrilling, it's deranged; 
I love it.

But then, abruptly, it's over.
Credits roll.
I shake my head;
my limbs are numb again.

Still have time to kill;
what a strange feeling.
Decide to be nice 
to my soon-to-be-home child.

Because unlike many of her classmates,
we're not hitting up Dulles International Airport
\u2014 in these Tariff Times? 
Thank you, no! <\/em>\u2014
for a long weekend of 
jet-setting travel 
and time zone twister.

Instead, I prepare 
a list of errands that 
can masquerade 
as afternoon adventures:
pick up some Girl Scout badges
grab some groceries;
figure out a dinner plan
and see where the 
rain-slick streets carry us.

Hear the front latch jiggle;
convince the kid to meet me in the car.
We wind our way out of the hood
on roads scattered with fallen branches
and clusters of acid lime-green oak leaves.

We drive to the village
buy impromptu unnecessaries 
at the local market:
Cherry Spindrift, and passionfruit, too.
Frozen macaroni balls 
and marshmallows, jumbo,
three vats of ice cream, 
one oat mylk for him.

Next:
a series of staccato 
questions, hers, and answers, mine:

\"Can I get Medjool dates?\" She asks.
     \"Sure.\" I reply.
\"Can I get cookies?\"
      \"Fine.\"
\"Can I get blackberries?\"
      \"As long as you eat them!\"
\"Can I get fancy tea?\"
     \"As long as you share!\"

Lightning Round:
\"Can I get a frozen pizza?\"
    \"No.\"
She begins to frown.
     \"Not here...
    \"Why don't you order a fresh one?\"

Her eyes blink.
I urge her, again, to order pizza.
\"Whatever you want, here's my card.\" 
She looks as me with shock, 
I am not normally This Mom.

But I'm feeling generous, untethered.
It's a rainy Friday in May.
Let's extract the magic from it somehow.
I send her ahead to the corner shoppe.

I pay and haul bags through the downpour.
I hoist wet sacks into my trunk.
I drive from one lot to another, 
to be closer to her.

We wait in a booth 
away from the cashier
the wafting aromas of oregano 
and fire-baked dough 
permeating our nostrils.

When it's time, we splash through 
heavy raindrops to the vehicle.
She positions the hot pie atop her thighs,
the one she chose with mushrooms 
and olives and sausage balls,
and she sighs, reverently.

It's the little things, I think.
Maybe I'm onto something.

= = =

It may be the official start of summer
but we're feeling winter goblin energy.

We pull in to home,
change into PJs.
Open chocolates, 
rustling noisy plastic 
and foil wrappers.

We make tea, 
squeeze honey.
find several blankets and pillows;
burrow into the sectional in the den.

We couch rot until Dad arrives
upon which we use 
our sedentary siren calls
to lure him in to our couch trap.

He joins us in flannel jams
and a soft tee.
We don't leave the couch 
nor the bright screen until bedtime. 

While the rains pelts away at
our roof overhead
we escape into the melodrama 
and mysteries of Widow Bay<\/em>.

We may not have left town,
but we have made our own escape.


<\/pre>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u201cEscape\u201d a vacation at home, written Friday, May 22, poem 142 in a series of 365 poems written by Diana Ludwick in 2026. Photo: “A Tropical Escape,” by Diana Ludwick (c) 2026. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1794,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,262,311,200,2,551],"tags":[1225,1227,1228,673,1230,1219,183,1235,1223,932,1232,865,1159,1220,1233,1231,1222,1236,1224,1229,361,234,1234,39,1221],"class_list":["post-1736","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-2026-poetry-challenge","category-dry-humor","category-generational","category-humor","category-poems","category-unserious","tag-adventure","tag-afternoon","tag-beef","tag-car","tag-cherry","tag-escape","tag-friday","tag-grocery","tag-honey","tag-ice-cream","tag-macaroni","tag-may","tag-memorial-day","tag-memorial-day-weekend","tag-oat-milk","tag-passionfruit","tag-pizza","tag-pizza-shoppe","tag-shop","tag-spindrift","tag-spring","tag-tea","tag-tropical","tag-village","tag-widows-bay"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1736","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1736"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1736\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1801,"href":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1736\/revisions\/1801"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1794"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1736"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1736"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1736"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}