the importance of the forced romantic getaway

Romance is the key element in the beginning of every relationship. It’s what drives the whole union. You meet, there is a chemical reaction, and, like two electric eels, you twist and dance and turn each other on. (I think that’s what eels do. If they don’t, I’m not sure why they’re here.)

But then this romance leads to marriage and children, and buying a house, and adopting some pets, and you begin making car payments, paying for school, carpooling, and spending weekends at gymnastic meets, and traveling to baseball games, and suddenly there is very little time for romance.

You ultimately become business partners in a horrible nonprofit organization. You’re doing good work. There’s a lot of love there and you’re helping people, but in order to achieve that romantic feeling that at one time came naturally, you now need a plan.

Welcome to the Romantic Getaway.

They’re goofy, and forced, and far from spontaneous, but if you want a healthy marriage you have to do it. Call your parents, beg a friend, hire a sitter, and have them come to watch the kids. All you have to do is get over the embarrassment of waving goodbye while you’re all aware that you’re heading off to a hotel to have sex.

Actually, you don’t have to be that embarrassed because here’s a little secret about the Romantic Getaway: At a certain point it’s not as much about the sex as it is about the sleep. You enter the peaceful serenity of an empty hotel room, without children and responsibility, and your brain literally disconnects. Before you even know what’s happened, it’s the next day and housekeeping is knocking on the door, telling you it’s checkout time.

A bed-and-breakfast is a favorite place for the Romantic Getaway, but I’ve always found that to be extremely creepy. If sex is what you’re after, a house built in the 1700s with a bed as creaky as a rusty wagon isn’t the most carefree and uninhibited environment. That’s always a creepy morning, coming down and sharing coffee with all the strangers who were eavesdropping on you the night before.

“Well, good morning, cowboy. Hi-ho, hi-ho,” says your irritated neighbor.

It’s like getting caught at your parents’ house.

Recently, my wife has been insisting that we go to spa resorts. These places are a work of genius. Let’s build a hotel with a golf course and a giant spa. He gets to golf and she gets the massage that he doesn’t want to give her. It’s foreplay by surrogate. Everybody wins!

The one kink in this perfect system is if you don’t golf. I play a little but not enough to leave my wife, in the middle of a vacation, for five hours without a guilt-free conscience. She sees this as an opportunity to drag me to the spa with her.

“Come on, we’ll get a couple’s massage, it will be great. Just relax and let your mind wander, it’s wonderful.”

It is not wonderful. Maybe for my wife, but I’m a man. A naked man. Being touched by a strange new lady. If I let my mind wander the way it wants to, it’s going to show. So the whole time I’m in there, I’m thinking about death and taxes and slow dancing with my grandfather. By the time I’m done I’m more tense than when I went in.

“Yeah, that was great. I’ll be back at one o’clock for the sandpaper loofah on my nipples.”

The thing about these romantic getaways is that, despite all the awkwardness, they really do work. We are so much happier when we return home to the battlefield and it really doesn’t matter where you go. Just go—anywhere, a hotel in the next city, a Motel 6 off the freeway, even that creepy motel in town that looks like a serial-killer boot camp.

We once stayed in our minivan while it was parked in the garage at our own house. We couldn’t find anyplace to go, so we pulled in, shut the garage door, waited to see if the kids could hear us, and had our own secret getaway, ten feet from our kitchen. We were out of the house, we were together; it counts.

It’s all about spending time alone. Not on the couch. Not brushing your teeth. Not those couple of minutes while the kids do the dishes. You need time to get past the logistical conversations of running a household and reach back to who you were as a new couple.

That couple who laughed together and really wanted to hear each other talk, because the talk was about the two of you, not pet vaccinations and clogged toilets. Back when you asked each other questions that had nothing to do with whether you locked the doors, or picked up the kids, or saw that rash on the dog’s ass.

It’s a real balancing act that the only person you are legally allowed to be romantic with is the same person who may be yelling at you about how you load the dishwasher. That’s why it’s imperative that you leave those roles behind, and as soon as you pull out of the driveway.

What doesn’t count as a romantic getaway is any trip that involves any of your family. You can’t call anything a “getaway” if it involves bringing the people you’re trying to get away from.

Your family is needy and judgmental and should be left at home. When you are holed up alone in a hotel together the only person who can judge you is the waiter delivering your room service. When you open the door in a robe, for the fourth order of chocolate-covered strawberries and the fifth bottle of champagne, sure, he’s going to judge you, but, unlike your mother, he’s not allowed to say anything about it.

So just go. Every once in a while, when you’re starting to get sick of each other, pack a bag, ditch that nonprofit organization, and run away from home.