By Amy Keyes 
I am sitting in my happiest place in the world: a beach in Puerto Vallarta in the middle of a frigid Minnesota winter. It’s 80 and sunny. And the sound of the waves has a magical way of melting away the chaotic hustle and bustle of the past months.
The footprints of the wet sand cement me in a path of moments that are washed away and then started again with each new step in the sunshine. It’s hard to go wrong when you’re lucky enough to dream your days away in a paradise like this for a few weeks. But that’s not why it’s my happiest place. Those are just the perks.
This vacation is a time-honored tradition that brings my family together from all corners of the world. Decade after decade of moments that began in my late teen years and have continued on to this very point in time, at which I stand on the horizon of my own kids entering that same phase of life I was in so many years ago.
My parents, who started this incredible tradition when they were younger than I am now, are walking through their golden years of life. I watch them, collecting these treasured moments together like the glittering seashells on the beach that we searched for time after time.
It looks so different for them now. Life moves at a much slower pace, navigating the unexpected challenges that age has placed in their paths. Living so much of these trips in the memories of years past. Grandkids popping in and out of their day with more and more infrequency each year as they spend their hours playing football on the beach or walking up and down the city streets.
It’s a bittersweet feeling seeing this shift of our original family unit walking the tightrope of time and change at a pace that is so hard to emotionally keep up with.
I have watched my kids grow up here year after year, just as my parents did with us. From the days when I carried them strapped to my back as we explored the town. Falling asleep in my lap at dinner, tiny arms wrapped around my neck as I breathed in the smell of saltwater and sun on their curls. Burying each other in the sand up to our necks and breaking free with a rush to the ocean to rinse off the sand and do it all again. Walks on the beach exploring new things together—the wonder and magic dancing in their eyes as they searched for shells and skipped rocks, running back and forth in the tide.
The memories circle around me like the waves, overtaking me with a nostalgia that spans from my own childhood to their almost adult years. This year, especially, feels so different. I have hardly seen my kids on this trip. It feels sometimes like I’m on my own vacation as I wake up to an empty room. No one needs much from me. Flexing the independence they have cultivated from the minute we get up until we reconvene for dinner together.
Walks on the beach with me have given way to walks with their younger cousins or runs on the beach on their own. No time for seashells, sandcastles, or burying. The magic of their time with us now something new as they see the world through their own lens.
Sometimes I find myself wallowing in the quickness of all of it. Feeling sad that our minutes together are now more pages to read in my book, miles to run in my daily exercise, or a few more blocks to meander down in solitude to pass the time.
But then I reemerge from that remembering that this is the cycle of life. My kids are out building memories with their cousins and with each other—the things they will carry forward in their hearts and futures as they build their own lives.
So as I sit here and gather up my own moments, and remember, I also hold space to dream, to cherish the notion that this trip, which began so long ago as a once-in-a-lifetime idea, is a tradition now three decades and counting.
This beach, this city, is now a place that feels like home to generations of our family and hopefully will for the generations to come. And I breathe in the magic of it all as the sun sets on another beautiful year.
by Heather McGuire 
by Gabrielle Grace 
