Long Road to Mom

We made the long trek to, Jacksonville, FLA, to be reunited with mom, and it really highlighted the amount of work it takes to travel, even before you get out the door. I take it for granted when R does all the planning and arrangements, whereas I generally taking care of food, driving, and children’s entertainment. It’s a great example of teamwork, but this time around the balls were all in my court.

First off, we had to change plans at the last minute, something R would have normally done. This was fairly easy with the internet, you just go to the website and click a few buttons and voila! A new flight plan. This also gave us more time to prepare and get things done around the house, but it still required treading into new territory. Good to experience these things to see how the other half lives.

When things were winding down to departure, it was a bit of a scramble, it always is, and again, I’m not used to handling things all by myself. I guess I’m spoiled by the fact that R takes care of everything. To complicate things, the day before our trip, we went to see the Dartmouth football game, and then visited friends who were just released from jail in NYC. They were Occupy New York protesters and semi-folk heroes around here. Anyway, I asked the kids to get some things ready the night before we left, because we had an early bus to catch. We were in pretty good shape but there are always a few loose ends to tie up before you lock that door.

All in all, things went fairly smoothly. We made it to the bus with a few minutes to spare, and even got a parking space, which is unusual for the Dartmouth Coach. They usually make you valet because parking is at a premium, but this was Sunday, so it was not crowded. We did, however, get nailed on the bus fare. Kids ride free with one paying adult, but it’s one kid per parent. This has not been a problem when R and I travel with the kids, but I was solo, and the driver said I needed to pay for one child. Bummer. Oh well, you can’t win them all.

The bus was a smooth ride, we got to the airport with time to spare. Since we checked in online, all we had to do was check in our bag and off to the gate. The airline, TransAir, has this policy of charging for check in luggage. As a consequence, all the passengers bring the ridiculously large carry on bags onto the plane. It’s crazy, and people are jockeying for overhead space. We got our seats and the kids were great on the flight over. It helped having my laptop and some movies. We landed in Atlanta, changed planes, and then were off to Jacksonville.

Anyway, I could go on for days about every minute detail of our trip. Suffice it to say that we made it, and though it was challenging, you realize you can do it if you just try. Things are rarely as bad as you think they’ll be, and with this in mind, you shouldn’t let anticipating hardship deter you from doing things. Just do it, right?

One thing I have to say is that our cell phones really helped out with all the changes we had to make, not to mention that we were not together and had to rendezvous at some point. I’ve become a fan, at least for travel.

Now we are here and the weather has been really nice. We hit the beach immediately, it hasn’t been too hot, and we got some supplies for our big Thanksgiving dinner, but more on that later.

For now, thanks for reading, and thanks to Betu Zelles for the pic.