DATE: Monday, August 25, 1997               TAG: 9708220016

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B9   EDITION: FINAL 

TYPE: OPINION 

SOURCE: ANN SJOERDSMA

                                            LENGTH:  105 lines

VACATION SPENDING AN ENDLESS SUMMER AT THE MOVIES

It's August. Everybody's on vacation or at the movies.

Come to think of it, a vacation can seem like a movie, sometimes, even including the classic lines. . . .

The Grand Hotel. Always the same. People come. People go. Nothing ever happens.''

Darn, Jane thought. Even the bellhop doesn't like the place. And she'd spent hours with Mother poring over full-color brochures before they'd picked this hotel. Now she'd probably never have that dreamed-about big romance while her parents weren't looking.

Frustrated and hot from the long minivan drive, Jane turned to her brother Steve: ``Well, here's another nice mess you've gotten me into.''

``Me?'' Steve protested.

``Why, everybody in Mandrake Falls is pixilated - except us,'' Jane complained. ``How will I ever be able to go home?''

Family summer vacations were a drag. One more year and Jane would be in college. One more year.

``I have to go to the can,'' whined little Dave, pulling on his sister's miniskirt, which barely hid the new rose tattoo on her thigh. ``Jaaane.''

What a nuisance!

``Dave, stop,'' June said to the 6-year-old at her hem. ``Stop, will you? Stop, Dave. Will you stop, Dave? Stop, Dave. I'm afraid. I'm afraid, Dave, my mind is going. I can feel it. I can feel it. My mind is going.''

Steve could see Jane was losing it. And she was plenty of trouble when she was calm. All that ridiculous love stuff, like some guy would just walk up to her and say: ``Your dream prince, reporting for duty!''

At 14, Steve was a no-nonsense type. All computers. ``Just shut up and deal!'' That was his motto.

``Relax, Jane,'' Steve volunteered. ``I'll get us the best rooms they have. Deluxe. I'm gonna make him an offer he can't refuse.''

Jane smiled. With one brother at the check-in desk, another in the john, and her parents unloading the van, she could ``mingle'' a little.

(She was just 17. You know what I mean?)

``OK,'' Jane replied. ``Just whistle when you're ready. You know how to whistle, don't you, Steve? You just put your lips together - ''

``Yeah, yeah - and blow,'' Steve said. ``But remember, I stick my neck out for nobody. You better be here when I get back.''

At last, Jane exulted, free at last. Time for an adventure. But, who? Who? Jane's eyes darted about the hotel, looking for the right somebody. And then she saw him, tall, lean, like the Marlboro Man without a cigarette, because cigarettes kill. And he was looking her way!

``Fasten your seat belt,'' Jane told herself. ``It's going to be a bumpy ride.''

``You lookin' at me?'' he asked, oozing sexy urban angst all over the place. Jane could scarcely breathe.

``Well, I'll tell you the truth now,'' he said. ``I ain't no cowboy, but I am one helluva stud!''

What a line! Dorothy will scream back home in Kansas.

Jane gathered her wits.

``You're not too smart, are you?'' she coolly replied. ``I like that in a man.''

Eeeek, she said it! She actually said it. Like a movie star. Like she was born to say it!

Eeeek, Mother! Mother? Mrs. Robinson was steering a course her way across the lobby. Mother was going to spoil everything.

``Come on, Jane honey,'' Jane's Mom said sweetly. ``Your father needs help with the baggage.''

Baggage. She had that right.

``Hey, I think that lady's talkin' to ya,'' the stud said astutely.

``Oh, that's, that's my mother,'' Jane said, fidgeting. ``My mother, what is the phrase? She isn't quite herself today.''

Oh, no. Not Dad, too!

``What we've got here is a failure to communicate, young lady,'' Mr. Robinson said sternly.

Communicate. Communicate. Jane's parents were always wanting to communicate with her.

``But I want to be alone,'' she pleaded.

``Do you feel lucky?'' Mr. Robinson said, turning to the boy. ``Well, do ya, punk?''

``Dad!'' Jane hollered like Tarzan.

``Here's looking at you, kid,'' the stud said, backing away. ``I'm gonna go order a chicken sandwich - hold the chicken, bring me the toast, give me a check for the chicken salad sandwich. . . . ''

``I know, I know,'' Jane mumbled. ``But you could've been a contender.''

Jane fixed an evil eye on her family, gathered around the matching set of plaid luggage.

``As God is my witness, as God is my witness, they're not going to lick me!'' she cried. ``I'm going to live through this and when it's all over, I'll never be humiliated again by my family!''

``I'm not living with you,'' Steve said, suddenly at Jane's elbow. ``We occupy the same cage, that's all.''

Jane looked longingly at the stud, who had just been asked by the hotel restaurant waitress: ``You want a leg or a breast?''

``Whoever you are,'' she whispered, ``I have always depended on the kindness of strangers.''

No, wait! Jane thought. I'll show them. I'll become a Navy SEAL.

* * * *

Come September, there'll be school and serious editorial commentary on academics, role models, discipline, family values.

But that's tomorrow. I'll think about all that tomorrow. MEMO: Ann G. Sjoerdsma, an attorney, is an editorial columnist and book

editor for The Virginian-Pilot.

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