That Not-So-Perfect Getaway Weekend

  Recently, my husband and I went away for a weekend. Many of my LOL friends do that all the time. They take a few days in New York, or Florida, or California, either with the husband or with the girlfriends, in which case the husbands are left behind, but never with the children.
  How does that work exactly? Our baby/child/teen is always on board -- even on our anniversary trips back to where we met (Chicago) and where we first lived together after we got married (Boston). When we have left him with grandparents for a long weekend, we usually feel guilty and end up missing him.
 This time, though, we had the perfect, guilt-free excuse to leave home sans child. He was on a Spanish class trip to Puerto Rico. When my husband suggested we go to New York, see a show, I was happily surprised. OK, I was stunned and then happily surprised. We never do anything that spontaneous.
  We drove up Saturday morning and immediately stood in line for half-price Broadway tickets at the TKTS booth. Our getaway weekend was on a budget, afterall. What should we see? My husband graciously deferred to me. I chose West Side Story. It's a classic. It has a love story (for me), lots of actions with all that gang stuff (for him) and beautiful music. I knew I'd love it. Surely he would too.
  We spent the afternoon hanging out in the hotel room. I was reading The Girl Who Played with Fire on my Kindle, while my husband was catching the World Cup, though he might have been better off with a nap.
  After a delicious dinner at an Afghan restaurant, we arrived early at the Palace Theater.  We had seats 17 rows from the stage, which sounded really close when we bought the tickets, but wasn't all that close when we got there, especially if we dwelled on the $140 we had paid. Still, it was an improvement over our usual mountaintop theater seats that cost less but require the Hubble telescope to make out the actors.
  The curtain went up and the play began with the familiar confrontation of the Jets and the Sharks. I loved it from the first minute. The price tag was well worth it, I thought. This weekend in New York was looking good. When Tony began to sing my favorite song, "Maria," I turned to my husband, expecting to see my smile reflected back.
  He, however, was in full slumber. The highlight of the weekend for one half, it turned out, was a $70 snooze.