You know how every state has a motto? This maxim is meant as an overarching declaration of theme and purpose — something that ties together the state’s nature and direction. Colorado’s [now somewhat ill-fitting] motto is “Nil sine numine” — “Nothing without God/providence”. Oklahoma’s [still strangely appropriate] saying is “Labor omnia vincit” — “Labor conquers all”.
If I were a state, I think that my motto might be: “Dang it Holly, I can’t take you anywhere.”
This mantra has been repeated many times over the course of my young life. Most often, it was said by some poor high school or college friend who had either just witnessed or been unwittingly dragged into one of my “scenes” (e.g. arguing with a public speaker in front of the entire Mines freshman class, inadvertently knocking a whole plate of sushi to the ground and silencing an entire restaurant, telling a professor that I found him attractive — in a platonic way, etc.).
Upon hearing my “motto”, I’d inevitably hang my head and apologize for my friend’s shame-by-association. My comrade would grumble a bit more, then usually admit, “Ugh, it’s fine. It’s not the first time, after all.”
I never really understood the embarrassment my companions felt, though. That is, not until I met Borealis — and now, I find myself branding him with the same motto.
“Dang it Bo, I can’t take you anywhere.”
You see, my son is a little carbon copy of me. Actually, scratch that — he’s a little carbon copy of my father. (In all seriousness — since the night he was born, everyone from my roommates to my deceased grandfather’s old colleagues have exclaimed over Bo’s familial resemblance.) Unfortunately, however, the similarity extends beyond just his appearance. Like me, and my father before me, Borealis is a little monster in public.
And I daresay nothing is more public than holiday travel. In the weeks surrounding Thanksgiving and Christmas, timid souls who rarely leave their home states brave public transit, long lines, and interminable delays to join family members around the nation for mystery casseroles and much-maligned traditions. The day that these events took place, it seemed as though every holiday traveler conveniently congregated as a captive audience in one place: Denver International Airport.
Now, if you’re never been to DIA, I recommend that you keep it that way — at least for the time being. Beyond [somewhat credible] conspiracy theories regarding everything from the strange/suggestive/malevolent art, the swastika-esque runway design, the purported bunkers beneath the airport, and the mysterious cash flow surrounding the construction of the white-capped monstrosity, DIA is currently the site of a massive renovation that has converted the check-in area into a labyrinthine nightmare reminiscent of the reptile house featured in Z is for Zoo. It is also famous for long security lines and generally unpleasant (if not completely odious) travel.
This story opens with the arrival of Borealis and me at DIA. “Why not Taylor, too?” you might ask. Well. To answer that question, I need to take a quick detour into the reason for our travel.
Our trip was bounded by two nonnegotiable events, 250 miles apart: NAIA Cross Country Nationals in Cedar Rapids on Friday, and Thanksgiving in Minneapolis the following Thursday. Seven days is a long time to book a rental car and an even longer time to have no car at all — so we decided to bring our own. However, we only had Thursday to travel, and Taylor flatly refused to drive for twelve straight hours with the car-averse baby. Consequently, we split tasks: the day before the race, Taylor drove our little SUV to Cedar Rapids, and I took the baby via airplane.
Which brings us back to the story at hand. After a mostly-hassle-free trip on the RTD (which I think might stand for Regional Transit Disappointment), Bo and I arrived on the scene — him, crying loudly in the front-carrier, and me, inadvertently beating my thigh against the empty yet incredibly-cumbersome car seat. After wandering aimlessly through the aforementioned maze for what felt like hours, I finally located United’s check-in counter and joined the line. Everyone in the surrounding vicinity turned to stare at us as Bo’s exhausted cries reached a new pitch.
Why was my child crying, you wonder? Well, I can answer you in only four letters: FOMO. Bo has an insanely strong “fear of missing out”. Even if he is — literally — too tired to stand, my son will stay awake by sheer willpower alone if he perceives that something exciting is happening around him. And what counts as exciting? It’s actually quicker to just tell you what *doesn’t* count as exciting: either laying down in his own crib in his own room, or sitting in his own car seat in our own car. Anything else is too enticing, and Borealis won’t sleep except under the most extreme fatigue. Therefore, my little terror was aggressively awake during the nearly two-hour RTD ride that *conveniently* coincided with what should have been his nap time, and was thus thoroughly exhausted before we even got to the airport, let alone to the baggage check-in line.
Luckily, said line moved pretty quickly, and soon enough a United employee directed us, “Please proceed to the open self-service kiosk in Section C.”
Incongruously, I replied, “Girl, people used to stare at me because I was cute. Now it’s because I have a screaming baby on my chest.”
The woman looked me up and down, taking in my already-stained jeans, poorly-done messy bun, and undoubtedly-smudged makeup. Her dubious reply of “hmm” followed me to the self-help station, while I wished for self-help of a different sort.
The combination of my bedraggled appearance and my son’s plaintive cries must have made me the consummate charity case, because almost immediately, a kindly attendant joined us at the kiosk. After scanning our boarding passes, she asked me, “Is this the only item you need to check?” gesturing to the cumbersome car seat.
“Yes, please,” I responded as Bo howled and lunged at our assistant.
“Ok, I can take care of it for you,” she answered. “Keep this claim ticket.”
“Thank you so much!” I half-sobbed as Bo forcefully bit my arm. (Either he’s teething or he’s turning into a zombie. Jury’s still out on that one.)
After discovering that an impenetrable barrier separated us from [the purportedly much speedier] North Security, I trudged to South Security with only the baby and diaper bag in tow. (All our other luggage was in the car with Taylor.) As we proceeded through the slow-moving and poorly-organized line, my little hellion finally cried himself out and lapsed into exhausted silence, drawing the applause of all surrounding travelers. (Just kidding — a little.)
“I can’t take you anywhere,” I muttered to his quietly sleeping head.
At this point, with the sudden windfall of silence, I figured that the balance of our TSA ordeal should be fairly low-key. After all, could anything be worse than the preceding cry-athlon?
The answer, of course, is yes. It is frustrating to have someone else [my child] ruin my day, but it is far worse when I ruin my own day — which is what I proceeded to do next. How, you might ask? I took a page out of my dog’s playbook in When Fur Babies Get Supplanted, and I let envy get the best of me. By the time I reached the metal-detectors, I was totally cooked through with resentment.
The subject of my covetousness? Well, about eight places ahead of me in line stood the woman that — in my most discontent, insecure, and ungrateful moments — I long to be. Around thirty years old, she stood with one hand on her high-end stroller, effortlessly poised and graceful. Every time the line advanced, she was a mama supermodel on a Parisian runway. I surreptitiously compared her salon-quality blonde curls with my box-brown tangles and cringed. Her makeup was elegant, yet natural, and she had paired a boutique-looking flowy top with artfully-torn skinny jeans and sensible heels. I tried to brush the dried food off of my Goodwill cardigan.
My attention shifted to her stroller. Her six- or seven-month-old daughter calmly blinked crystal-blue eyes up at the tented ceiling. I looked down at the tear-tracks still marring the cheeks of my snoozing infant son and tried to picture him behaving so amiably. My imagination wasn’t up to the task.
And the coup d’etat? The woman’s practically-new Petunia Pickle Bottom bag. For those of you who don’t know, PPB is a borderline-baby-couture brand of fashionable diaper bags. It didn’t even cross my mind to ask for one at my baby shower. (And actually, if I had gotten a PBB bag, I probably would have resold it on eBay anyway.) I fiddled uncomfortably with the poorly-resewed strap of the torn diaper bag for which I *had* asked.
The object of my fixation never looked my way, which was good, because she definitely would have caught me staring. As she exited the Security area, I berated myself for having wallowed for so long in this quagmire of mopeyness. Cognitively, I *know* that my worth is found in Christ, and Him alone. But in those lonely moments, isolated in a crowd of strangers, the appeal of glossy hair and a fashionable bag is nearly unbearable.
But then again, so too was Jesus’s temptation after His forty-day fast in the wilderness. I repeated to myself the one scripture I can always remember from that section: Matthew 4:4 — “‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.’” It wasn’t the perfect fit for my situation, but even still, my soul was immediately comforted. I was finally able to forgive the other mom for her style and poise, and my heart was buoyed as we left Security behind us.
Bo awoke on the tram ride to the B Concourse, and by the time we were halfway to our gate, he was once again lurching about like a drunken sailor. I detoured to an empty gate, where I removed Bo from the carrier, changed his diaper, and let him shuffle around for a little bit before we had to get on the plane.
As I let my son “play”, a friendly United employee came over to coo at him and to admire his newest talent — standing independently. She then told me all about her thirteen-year-old son, who had been Bo’s age just yesterday! … or at least, that’s how it seemed. “I miss it so much!” she sighed, looking at my child.
Honestly, it’s pretty hard to constantly hear older women tell me, “Enjoy this age! It goes by so fast!” when it seems like every day drags on for an eternity. I always want to level the speaker with a glare and challenge, “It better.” As I looked at my smiling son, though, I knew that someday in the future, I’ll have good memories from this stage — one or two, at the very least.
The kindly employee said goodbye, and Borealis and I headed to our gate. For the time being, my son was all smiles, and I dared to hope that this moment might even become one of those fond recollections someday. (Spoiler Alert: It won’t.)
As we boarded, I looked down the length of the airplane, craning my neck to see past the row of people slowly puzzling their luggage into the overheard compartments. I was hoping to spy a free middle seat next to our aisle one, but as I located 11D, I saw that my dreams were not to be. A husky, thirty-something-year-old man occupied the center seat, next to an empty window seat — only, as we approached, I realized that the window seat wasn’t actually empty after all. Peering out the aperture was an eighteen-month-old with dark eyes and fluffy blond hair. What are the odds, I thought. Sitting down, I told the dad, “If my son cries, I’m going to make a big scene about how you can’t control your kid.”
Laughing, he retorted, “Not if I ring for a flight attendant first!”
But there was no need for such blame-shifting — at least, not at first. I nursed during take-off, and the flight began well enough. Bo masticated/massacred the safety manual, intermittently swatting the man next to me with his hand or the manual. Meanwhile, I critically assessed Hemispheres Magazine’s November edition of “Three Perfect Days”, which advertised my long-time nemesis — Denver. Bizarrely, the cover picture featured a young lady in a fifties-style dress walking through a lush field of sunflowers. An endless blue sky spread above a picturesque fringe of indigo Rocky Mountains along the horizon. While less attractive, a more accurate promotion would have been a photo of a med-card-toting hipster with weather-beaten skin and long, tangled beard and ponytail, reclining casually against his Subaru, with a craft beer in one hand and his climbing shoes in the other. I flipped through the magazine to read [i.e. judge] the rest of the article, but at that moment, Borealis tore the publication out of my grasp and started to eat it. I returned Hemispheres to the seat-back pocket and went back to staring blindly into middle distance.
Next to us, Dad and Son (traveling without Mom for the first time) relaxed like old pros. Son leisurely perused his stack of airplane-themed baby books (without even trying to chew on them!), while Dad texted using the in-flight wifi and intermittently regaled me with stories of other times that he, Mom, and Son had traveled — to New Zealand, to Hawaii, to Boston, to Georgia. As Bo’s chatter became more and more tired/cranky, I listened to how Son had actually always been a good traveler, and yes, he loved to read and had *always* loved to read, and would even sometimes independently pick up a baby book and flip through it on his own — and no, of course he didn’t eat books — what a strange question!
By halfway through the two-hour flight, I could no longer deny that Bo’s grumbles had shifted from “babbling” to “crying”. I fed him again and tried [unsuccessfully] to bounce him without jostling Dad or the tray-table behind me. Meanwhile, Bo’s cries continued to rise in volume and pitch, drawing the attention of surrounding passengers and distracting the tired-looking executive sitting catacorner to me. (Other things I can tell you about this man: his name; his position, company, and parent company; the number, gender, and approximate ages of his children; the name of his executive assistant; his affinity for basketball documentaries; etc. So when I said that I was staring blindly into middle distance, I meant that I was actually reading all of Hank’s emails. The fidelity on an iPad is phenomenal.)
The issue, once again, was that we were surrounded by people. Anytime Bo started to drift off, Dad would think of another travel story that he hadn’t shared yet, or a flight attendant would eye the baby’s chew-toy cup and ask if I had any trash, or Son would exclaim over his airplane book, or Hank would cough — and my child would be instantly, jarringly awake… but still desperately tired. I have actually only seen him that exhausted a handful of times in his life. Each time, the presence of foreign entities precluded what should have been a deep and restful slumber, and no amount of rocking or coaxing could make up for the proximity of other people.
Eventually, the flight attendants completed their rounds and the seat belt sign went off. I speed-walked past rows and rows of judgmental eyes as my son wailed louder and louder. Now thoroughly embarrassed and not just a little frustrated, I stood by the closet-restrooms and bounced with all the zest that comes with a comprehensive public shaming, gaining altitude with every recalcitrant sob emanating from the front-carrier. Soon, I was positively leaping up and down in the back of the plane, drawing curious glances from flight attendants and potty-goers alike.
It bears mentioning that vigorous rocking/bouncing/swinging is actually the best way to calm down my adrenaline-junkie infant son. Sure enough, by the time my calves were practically weeping with exertion, Bo had slumped into another enervated slumber. I crab-shuffled sideways through the crowded aisle, dodging feet, elbows, shoulders, and big hair on my way back to our seat. I crumpled into the chair, reclasped my seatbelt (safety first!), and considered taking a nap myself. Deciding against it for lack of time, I pulled out my airplane-moded phone and continued work on a story called Online Dating for Stay-at-Home-Moms (still unpublished). Ubiquitous crop circles and solitary farmsteads barely visible through Son’s window had me hoping that our approach into Cedar Rapids was imminent.
And, in fact, it was — just not imminent enough. Maybe it was Son’s loud tapping on the window. Maybe it was Dad’s response of, “Well, good luck with that,” when I told him that I had left engineering to be a stay-at-home mom. Maybe it was me as I noticeably stiffened at Dad’s response. Maybe it was the ever-present flight attendant, asking once more for that mangled cup.
Maybe it was none of these things. Maybe it was all of them. All I know is, in the final ten minutes of our flight, my son woke up, and it was like the end of the world.
Seriously. When I read, “‘Go and pour out the bowls of the wrath of God on the earth,’” in Revelation 16:1, I can’t help but picture my son’s blood-curdling cries as one of the plagues. People genuinely turned to stare — both because crying babies are horribly distracting and because I was virtually topless, desperately trying to get Borealis to nurse from my tapped-out breasts. I hope everyone else enjoyed the peepshow, because I, for one, did not. Bo refused to latch for more than two seconds, and to be honest, I was mildly embarrassed that breastfeeding had so significantly deflated the size of my normally-ample breasts. I wanted to shout to the crowd, “It normally goes better than this!” but that certainly would have surrendered what little dignity I had left.
The flagrant nudity was actually pretty pointless, anyway. From experience, I knew that Bo wasn’t truly hungry — just seeking a balm for the discomfort of his exhaustion. (It is also nearly impossible to feed him “real food” when his eyes are glued shut with tears and his throat is occupied with wailing.) As I tried again — unsuccessfully— to stick a nipple into my child’s screaming mouth, Dad graciously averted his eyes and helpfully told me about a time when Son had cried once or twice during one of their many plane rides, meriting a rude and judgmental comment from a fellow passenger on their flight. I thought that I would probably die of shame if I knew all of the rude and judgmental comments that were currently being thought my way.
But, as they say in the medical world, “All bleeding stops eventually”, and this situation was no different. The plane landed, and Bo cried; the plane taxied, and Bo cried; the seatbelt sign went off, and I cried. I don’t think I have ever been more eager to get off of a plane.
Hank gave me a sad smile that may have said, “I’ve been there”, or maybe, “I’m sorry that you’re so poor that you didn’t buy your child another seat”. You never can tell with tired-looking executives.
Assuming that we were a family, the lady behind me tactfully said, “Well, overall, they were both pretty good!” Dad beamed with pride, tussling Son’s blond fluff. Not wanting to drag Dad down with me, I politely clarified, “I usually travel with my husband, but today it was just me. Much harder than I expected!” Although, now that I think about it, maybe I should have thrown Dad under the bus after all. “If only this jerk had taken a turn with the baby!” Haha.
Eventually, cross-check was complete, and the plane started to empty. When the line got to our row, everyone in the surrounding seats let me go in front of them. I sputtered my thanks and seized the chance to vacate the plane sooner. With my child still uttering heartbreakingly sad sobs, I jetted from the jet, not stopping until I reached the exit of the airport.
But then, I realized that I hadn’t retrieved the car seat or arranged for transportation, so I had to turn around and go back inside. The silver lining of my flight from our flight was that the movement had calmed Borealis somewhat, so only muffled whimpers escaped from the front-carrier at this point. I grabbed our car seat from the carousel and called my hotel. An overly-chipper chirp greeted me.
“Hi, this is Halie, how may I direct your call?”
“Hi Halie,” I responded, “I have a reservation for tonight, and I need the airport shuttle to come get me.”
“Um,” came a markedly-less-chipper chirp from the other end. “We don’t have an airport shuttle.”
“… Are you sure?” I couldn’t help but ask.
“Yes, quite sure. But you could take an Uber or Lyft here!”
Looking at my reservation on the booking site, I confirmed that the hotel purportedly did provide airport transportation. Knowing that Halie had nothing to do with these arrangements, but still wanting to vent my frustration, I stated, “Hotel Tonight says that your hotel has an airport shuttle. I would not have booked your hotel if not for the shuttle. Are you saying that the information I received was false?”
The now distinctly-un-chipper chirp responded, “Yes, that is what I’m saying.”
“Ok,” I sighed resignedly. “We’ll get there somehow.”
Since it’s 2018, that “somehow” was via Uber. I was surprised that the app was downloaded on my phone and even more surprised that my information was already entered. [Note: While this description makes it sound as though I downloaded and populated my Uber app in an amnestic moment after a crazy night of college drinking, this was absolutely not the case. Later, I remembered that back in April 2017, I had been forced to procure my own transportation to the airport at the end of a three-day long Schlumberger interview, upon the realization that the service company’s arrangements had *accidentally* left me stranded high and dry at the hotel.]
Once I summoned our makeshift chariot, I wrestled my once-again-screaming son into his car seat, then went to stand outside to scare away loiterers / wait for our driver. No matter how much I swung him or rocked him, my child continued to cry and cry. I had started crying again during my phone chat with Halie and hadn’t bothered to stop yet.
When Miss Uber pulled up, my son and I were in the midst of a neck-and-neck competition for most guttural and heartrending cry. I saw the moment our driver identified us. Her eyes got wide, and she kind of looked around to see if someone else might be her true passenger instead. Undeterred, I flung open the car door, crammed in the car seat, and then circled to sit behind her in the backseat.
“I’m sorry we’re both crying,” I sobbed. “He’s so tired. He’s so, so tired, but he can’t sleep because we’ve been around people for hours and hours. He’ll probably fall asleep on the way.”
“It’s ok,” Miss Uber said unconvincingly. “Just the other day, I had someone who cried on their ride. And I’ve had crying kids before too.”
I [mistakenly] perked up at that. “Oh, do you have kids of your own then?”
Disconcertingly, Miss Uber laughed. “No way! I would never want kids. They’re scary, and so much work.”
“Um,” I managed eloquently. I looked over at my high-maintenance son, who was already calming under the soothing effects of the car’s sounds and motion. I decided to change the subject. “Have you lived in Cedar Rapids long?” I asked.
“Seventeen years!” the driver responded. This looked to be about half of her life. “Where are you from?”
“Just west of Denver,” I responded automatically. “A little town called Golden.”
“Ah yes, I know Golden!” Miss Uber exclaimed. “The home of Coors and Colorado School of Mines!”
“Um, yes, those things are in Golden,” I responded hesitantly. A sinking feeling settled in my gut even before Miss Uber spoke again.
“I just LOVE Colorado! My absolute favorite place to visit. You guys are so lucky to live there!”
Now, don’t get me wrong. There are great parts of Colorado. It’s a beautiful state, and a really fun place to be if you love the outdoors or craft beer or weed and don’t mind a distinct lack of community and/or long-term culture. However, the relevant merits and weaknesses of Colorado are not the point here. Regardless of my affinity (or lack thereof) for my state of residence, I have no interest in shaving years off my life and adding countless wrinkles to my face in order to travel to another state… only to have my Uber driver tell me that I never should have left in the first place.
I quickly attempted to curtail any further discussion of Colorado. “Yeah, it’s great! Anyway, is there anything we should make sure to visit in Cedar Rapids while we’re here?”
Luckily, this tactic seemed to work. Miss Uber rattled off some points of interest — New Bohemia (an up-and-coming downtown district), the National Czech & Slovak Museum and Library, and several popular breweries.
Then I asked, “I thought I heard someone mention caves in the area — are there any nearby?”
[Note: There are. The name “Makoqueta Caves State Park” is a dead giveaway here, although the site is currently closed for the season.]
“Umm… I’m actually not sure!” my amateur tour guide answered. “But you know where there are some great caves? Rifle Falls State Park in Colorado. Do you know where Rifle is?”
“Yes?” [Author’s Note: No.]
“Oh my gosh, it’s so beautiful there. You don’t even have to hike if you don’t want to — the waterfalls are — BOOM! — right there when you drive up! Of course, you can hike too, if you want to. There’s a trail that goes up behind the waterfall if you feel like hiking. But if, say, you were in a wheelchair, then you’d still be able to see the falls.”
“Um, that’s nice,” I posited during her pause for breath.
“And you would never know it, but basically right next door to that park is Rifle Gap State Park. Much less busy, and honestly I thought it was even better. Have you ever been to either?”
“I don’t think so,” I hedged — although, to be honest, I’m not sure the nature of my answer actually mattered.
“I’ve been to practically all the state parks in Colorado,” Miss Uber continued. [Note: She clearly has not accomplished the same feat in her own state.] “I just love them all so much. Do you go up to the mountains much?”
This question put me instantly on the defensive, because: 1) no, we do not go up to the mountains much, and 2) no, I do not love being judged for staying in the foothills. I immediately began rattling off my standard list of reasons/excuses.
“Not really. I don’t do any of the winter sports, and it’s been really hard to take the baby anywhere at this age. Also, I-70 is hellish, especially on the weekends, so we —”
Here, Miss Uber cut in again. “Oh, absolutely. I-70 is a nightmare. I always make sure to avoid certain places in Colorado on the weekends at this point — even Estes, which didn’t use to get nearly as crowded as it does now! It also bums me out that some of my favorite places can only be reached by interstate — like Georgetown, for instance. Do you know where Georgetown is?”
“Yes?” [Author’s Note: No.]
“Yeah, Georgetown is great. Oh, and so is Buena Vista. I love those high mountain deserts. Oh, but I also always have fun in the Great Sand Dunes.”
For the rest of our twenty minute drive, Miss Uber painted a glorious verbal picture of the wonders of Colorado, leaving me to fervently hope that Yelp would be more obliging when it came to providing travel trips for Cedar Rapids. Intermittently, I would try to leverage a lull in the monologue to weakly provide a “defense” for my family’s shameful lack of Colorado travel stories — but invariably, Miss Uber would interrupt each of my explanations with another enthusiastic story about one of her many fantastic mountain explorations. I eventually just gave up trying to justify my travel choices.
Finally, blessedly, we arrived at the hotel. I hopped out before the car had even stopped. Retrieving the car seat with my now-smiley-giggly infant, I said, “Look — when he’s good, he’s great! … but when he’s bad, he’s kinda awful.”
“Yeah, I really didn’t like him when you guys first got in my car!” the driver blithely declared. “But I like him now!”
Hmm. And they say that honesty is the best policy. (Oh, and speaking of honesty… I should probably admit that Miss Uber’s closing remark earned her a $0 tip on the Uber app. “Well fine! If you don’t like my son, then I bet you don’t like money either!” I felt better immediately and then guilty soon afterwards.)
We checked in with chipper-chirper Halie, who assured me that they had contacted Hotel Tonight to remove the erroneous promise of free transportation, which didn’t help me but would hopefully prevent a recurrence of the incident.
“You’ll be on the second floor of the pool building, which you can access by going up to the fourth floor, walking across the skywalk, and then taking the elevator at the end of the hallway down a level.”
One look in my cold, dead eyes let Halie know what I thought of that plan.
“On second thought,” she backpedaled, “let me see what I can do about moving your room.”
I swung Bo around in the car seat in increasingly horizontal circuits as Halie’s perfect manicure skittered over the keys.
“There!” she declared with a chirpy flourish. “I’ve moved you to the first floor in this building. Super easy to get there — just go up this ramp and down the hall.”
It was not, in fact, super easy to get there, as I discovered thirty seconds later as we arrived at the Grand Ballroom.
“Holly!” I heard the Ghost of Hotels Past calling after me. “Down the other hall!”
“Thanks Halie!” I yelled back. It would have been nice to know that I had to go up *two* ramps and then down the hall.
And so, after nine-ish hours of travel and several pints of tears, Borealis and I made it to our hotel room, where he promptly crawled over to the mirrored closet door and began to coo and smile at the “other baby”. I dropped into an exhausted heap on the bed, looked at my son, and said:
“Dang it Bo, I can’t take you anywhere.”
I’m writing this from back in Colorado — nine days of travel and 2200 miles on my odometer later. Taylor made it safely to the hotel, and even though a travel-addled Bo woke up an unprecedented six times to nurse that night, the trip got progressively better over the course of the next week, culminating with an exhausting two-day trek back to Colorado in the car.
As far as “family vacations” (as opposed to “couple vacations”) go, this one was generally a pretty good one. It actually turned out that the worst day of the trip was — without a doubt — the one recounted herein.
So, without further ado, here are the morals of the story, as I “learned” them:
- Don’t dare to compare. Christ alone is where my worth should be found.
- When traveling with kids, always bring along another adult to whom I can shift the blame.
- Always check with the hotel itself to confirm the existence of an airport shuttle.
- When traveling in another state, never, under any circumstance, reveal that I am from Colorado.
- Remember that tomorrow is a new day, with new strangers for my baby to terrorize. After all, the strangers from yesterday have already forgotten by now.
- Thank goodness we’re not traveling for Christmas!
I’m from Colorado! It is amazing here! You guys should really get up to the mountains or down to CSprings more 😉