Traveling with Baby

When I was in college and law school, traveling was easy. I would decide on a whim to take a trip home, and fifteen minutes later I'd be on the interstate, packed and ready for a weekend at the beach. On a few occasions I managed to talk friends into taking sporadic trips during the week, promising to return in time for the 9:00 a.m. class the following day. I convinced my husband (who was my boyfriend at the time) late one school night that the trip to my beach-home would only take an hour (ok...it's really closer to three...).

Traveling was easy. Traveling was fun.

But life has changed.

This past weekend we made the trip home for Easter. It began around 9:00 a.m. Thursday morning with my first load of laundry.

At 6:00 p.m. I begin folding the last load. I am on schedule (sort of). All is well.

6:10: Lee arrives home from work (early!). We begin packing in earnest. My goal is to leave by 7:00.

6:35: Laila, who has been napping for almost three hours, wakes up hungry. No worries. I feed her, change her diaper, and put her in her carrier. She coos and smiles. So far so good.

6:50: We begin packing the car. Ok. This is a bit challenging. After unloading and reloading it several times, I begin to understand why people get minivans (sort of...). I even consider getting one of those embarrassing luggage-thingys to put on top of the car.

7:10: We are completely packed and ready to go when I realize I forgot Connor's nebulizer (absolutely essential for an asthmatic child). I run back into the house to get it, and while inside I realize I also forgot to grab a book, my sunglasses, Connor's puppy, a bottle of water, Laila's pacifier, etc. etc.

7:26: We finally start the car. Only 26 minutes behind schedule. Not too bad.

7:35: We pull into Wendy's. We pay, and they ask us to pull forward and wait. Bad sign. Ten minutes later they bring out a kid's meal and a chicken sandwich. We remind them about the chocolate shake. Several minutes later they return with that. Only then do we realize we don't have any napkins or straws. Gotta love fast food.

7:50: We are back on the road. Laila starts puttering.

7:55: We pull over at a gas station to soothe a screaming baby. We are a whole three miles from home. We sit in the parking lot for about twenty minutes while I nurse Laila.

8:35: We pull over at a rest stop to soothe a still-screaming baby. Lee swings her in her carrier for about twenty minutes, until she falls asleep.

9:45: Laila is screaming (again). We make our fourth and final stop, at Starbucks. We sip our coffee and give the baristas evil looks as they ooh and aah over our sweet baby. "Take her," I beg. They laugh, as if they think I am joking.

10:20: We are still at Starbucks. Lee says "I don't care if she screams the rest of the way. We're leaving, and we're not stopping again." I concur. Miraculously, Laila is quiet the rest of the way (babies understand so much more than we give them credit for...).

11:30: We arrive at my parents' house, four hours after we began. I reflect on the time when I made this same trip in two hours flat. Record time, yes, But life was so different back then.