The only true vacation we have taken this year was a weekend trip to Dallas to visit some friends.

And that may be the highlight of 2020 in terms of vacations.

In the spring, we bought airplane tickets to Florida to spend four glorious days on Madeira Beach on the Gulf Coast near Tampa Bay, Florida.

Then the coronavirus hit Florida and we canceled that trip, much to our chagrin. We had cheap airline tickets on Allegiant, a great deal on a hotel right on the beach and a great view of the ocean.

Once we canceled that trip, we downsized to a two-day trip to Branson, Missouri, that second weekend in July. That didn’t work out and we canceled that driving vacation. We had a great hotel right on the strip that has always been booked every time we tried to stay there.

We did manage to take a pair of trips to Mitchell, South Dakota. I went one week and Susan went the next week. We went to see our daughter, son-in-law, granddaughter and grandson. I don’t count this as a true vacation because we didn’t go together.

We would like to squeeze in another trip to South Dakota before Christmas but not might not work out, either.

Some states are targeting Oklahoma because we had a spike in testing and confirmed cases of the coronavirus. New York wants people from Oklahoma to quarantine for two weeks in order to visit that state. No thanks.

We have some retired friends who have a really nice motorhome. They like to drive around the country in the summer but this year, they are choosing to take short trips within Oklahoma. They don’t want to get quarantined in some state and unable to leave.

Almost everybody I have talked to about 2020 vacations say they have canceled trips, some to Europe and other places.

And people are fearful of air travel. We flew to South Dakota with no problems, even though we had to make connections both ways through DFW – which used to be one of the busiest airports in the nation. I don’t know how busy it is now but I do know that the business for American Airlines has fallen and there have been some layoffs, even here at the maintenance center in Tulsa.

I usually cover college football games in the fall. And I am sure that I will cover some games – especially the Tulsa Golden Hurricane – this season. I would like to see TU play Oklahoma State in Stillwater.

I have gone to football games at Oklahoma every year since 1970. That’s 50 years of seeing at least one OU game in person each year. This year, I don’t know. I want to go but there are sure to be restrictive rules for the press box and generally I would rather watch the game on TV than sit in the stands.

We usually stay home for Thanksgiving for a number of reasons. First, our family is mostly here. Secondly, it’s impossible to get an inexpensive or convenient flight that week.

Christmas is a puzzle.

We take a week off work every year between Christmas and New Year’s. It’s a slow time for our business and it gives us a much-needed break.

In January, I would have told you there was a good chance that we would take our family on an ocean cruise to Central America at Christmas. We have done that twice and it was a great time of getting together and enjoying seeing different ports while being treated like royalty aboard the ship.

I don’t think that is going to happen this year. The chances of being quarantined on a cruise liner are too great.

So, what will we do?

We don’t like “staycations” at Christmas because it is impossible to resist working when we should be relaxing.

One year, we took our kids to Branson after Christmas for a few days and that was nice. We rented a three-bedroom condo but these days, we would need a four-bedroom condo or two condos. And frankly, a lot of the attractions at Branson shut down at Christmas (I don’t blame them), so there’s not a whole lot to do.

The goal would be to spend time together. Two of our three kids don’t live in Tulsa and family time is at a premium.

We will get together somewhere at Christmas. We also want to spend time with Susan’s parents during the holidays. It’s been rough on them. The senior center where they live has been locked down for months. It’s very restrictive and no fun to put up with.

We want everyone to be safe. That’s hard under the current circumstances.

It would be nice to have four weeks of paid vacation and have the freedom to travel anywhere in the world by airplane or ship. But it looks like that won’t be available for the rest of 2020.