Club Med with Clay

I’m completely relaxed, as I sit here with the laptop on my lap… almost lethargic. The island music is softly playing behind me where I can hear the bartender dumping a bucket of ice into the ice-bin. The ocean is softly lapping against the rocks in front of me and a gentle breeze is fluttering my hair. The scent of salty air is mixed with the wine I’m sipping. It’s about 6:30 and the sun has slipped behind the clouds on the horizon leaving a pale apricot hue to the sky. Paradise.

To my left is Clay Boyce. He’s dozing with his shoes off in an Adirondack chair. He’s had an exciting three days, especially yesterday when he turned ninety years old (I wrote this last week but haven’t had strong enough WiFi to post it). We are at Club Med—Columbus Isle. They did a fantastic job of fussing over him and making his birthday a big deal, which it was. Club Med has a shirt that is standard issue at every Club Med… it has a 45 on it. No one knows why this is the most popular shirt for the company, but it is. As you know two 45s equals 90, therefore the management made the executive decision to have two of their female employees (GOs) guide him to his birthday party, one on each arm. Of course they had their 45 shirts on and Clay wore his shirt that said; It Took Me 90 Years to Look This Good.

We were all surprised when he was escorted to the theater after dinner, and they placed us in the front row. Well, okay I wasn’t surprised because they told me ahead of time, but Clay was very surprised when one of the top management guys at the resort dedicated a song to him, “Fly me to the Moon.”

He preceded his song by explaining to the audience who Clay was. Are you curious who Clay is yet? He came with Joe, me, and our buddy Bill to Club Med. I met him two years ago at Il Forno Classico in Gold River, California. I was sitting next to him at the bar and struck up a conversation with him… shocker huh? He had an iPad open and was perusing his collection of photos. The one that got my interest was a picture of the Saturn launch vehicle for the Apollo Program—I asked him about it. That was two years ago and now I’ve almost completed his biography. Someday you’ll be notified by me that his book is published.

Anyway his big day was definitely a big day! My present to him was a bottle of Oban Scotch. I knew the scotch at Club Med was probably going to be a disappointment to him, so I brought it from home. It was a good thing because he disliked their scotch so much he switched to light beer! He was very, very happy to have his Oban!  :)

Joe’s birthday was three days later and definitely low key compared to Clay. But it was fun because it was on White Night when everyone dresses in white and the restaurant is moved outdoors by the pool. Because it’s an elegant, romantic night several of the Bahamian waitresses softly sang happy birthday to him.