Clark’s Seafood & Chop House- Wishes

A picky eater with lots of allergies visits Clark’s Seafood and Chop House with her family

Little River, SC

August 18, 2023

Friday, 3:00pm

Lis in front of Clark's Seafood and Chop House

Flight or Fight

The flight was scheduled for 7:40am on a Friday, the airport was an hour away, and the airline required us to arrive two hours before take off. So, the adventure of bringing Lynn back to campus for her senior year of college was due to begin well before the sun even thought about rising. To top it off, the sun had already declared that it wouldn’t be rising at all and had relinquished it’s place in the sky with torrent rain clouds intent on flooding any drivable surface.

Fight

I had lamented to anyone who would listen that it wasn’t fair that our flight had to be so early. We had two days to kill before moving Lynn in on Sunday. But the flight was cheap and it was more cost effective to spend an extra time at a hotel than to fly out on the weekend. So for the whole week leading up to this flight leaving at a time that rarely sees me out of bed, I complained. My exact words were “I would not be opposed if the flight gets delayed. In fact, I wish the weather is really bad and it does.”

And those words are what made everything that happens next completely my fault.

All My Fault

Most of the time my wishes don’t come true. However, when they’re weather related they do and I have been warned by my husband, Dan, that his fellow colleagues on the commuter bus demanded I stop. I guess I forgot…sorry!

The last time I made a weather related wish was in 2011. Our New England winters had been snowy, but we hadn’t had a good storm. Like the kind of snow storm that closes the state (i.e. highways and all public buildings shut down for a couple days). So I casually commented, “Gosh, it’s been a while since we’ve had a good blizzard. I really wish we’d get one this year.”

And then we did.

We had so many storms that winter that by January we had at least seven feet of flakes and the men were on roofs shoveling snow so stores, schools, and homes wouldn’t cave in. We had never experienced a winter so bad and after Dan announced to the world that I did this, I stopped wishing for weather and our winters have been fairly mild since.

Until this weekend.

I did it again. I wished on the weather and what should have been an easy drive and an uneventful flight was anything but.

Flight

Dan and Lynn had already gone upstairs to bed the night before our departure, but since Lynn is attached to her phone 24/7, she saw the text alerting us that our flight was delayed. She told me and I told Dan, but not before doing a not so subtle happy dance in my robe and slippers. I excitedly woke Dan up with the news that our flight had been delayed three hours and we no longer had to leave the house by 4:30am. Yay!

So we slept. Don’t worry, we woke up with plenty of time to shower and even sizzle bacon before needing to leave. About five minutes into our one hour trek to the airport the clouds unleashed their tears. Tears is an understatement. Angry waterfall is better. We sloshed our way slowly down the highway, the wipers unable to keep up, visibility at zero. At one point, the highway was under construction, so of course a piece of gravel spun up and dinged the windshield causing an instant horizontal crack along Dan’s line of sight.

If I haven’t mentioned in previous posts, Dan is a man with a plan. Always searching for ways to make our future a little easier. He had pre-purchased a parking pass for the airport lot. This was brilliant, except it was raining so hard the scanner was unable to read the QR code so he had to insert his card and pay again. I assured him that surely he could call the parking lot vendor and get a refund when we returned, but unfortunately there were no refunds, no excuses, so we paid double. All because I wished for a bad rain storm.

Avel-no

We made it to the airport on time. Although, this two room concrete outhouse can hardly be considered an airport. Landing zone is more like it. Eighteen chairs fill the one and only terminal. Floor seating was a luxury for a few and the rest stood on the short ramp leading from the ten step walk through baggage check to TSA to the terminal. We were lucky to snag actual seats and I felt triumphant as I gleefully exclaimed to Dan that all was good – we got to sleep in, insurance would fix the window, and we got seats. And our Alvelo flight was dirt cheap. And then the text came. The flight would be delayed another hour. Lynn and Dan settled in, gaming on their phones while I opened a book. I had read about ten pages when the next message came through and then another five pages before the last text. Overall the flight was delayed six hours. But at least we had seats in the terminal.

Final Wish

We landed in South Carolina just in time for supper. This time Dan made the wish. To dine at the steakhouse we didn’t have time for during Parents’ Weekend last fall. Clark’s. About forty minutes from our hotel, Clark’s Seafood & Chop House provided a warm atmosphere with large windows overlooking the marina. Dan appreciated the water view and Lynn and I were just happy to have a comfy oversized booth to sink into. The sun’s rays danced across the marina, making the water sparkle and the boats gleam. Wood accents throughout offered warmth against the cool air conditioning. A wall of mirrors in the back, gave the dining area a sense of largeness that didn’t overpower the close intimate atmosphere.