You Probably Never Want to Travel with Me

“I’m going to be sick.”
“Please don’t.  I’ll get sick.”

Picture this.  Me, my two toddlers, and my younger brother, Ryan.  Making a four and a half hour trek – including frequent potty breaks – to Pennsylvania to visit my dad.  Our goal (known as The Plan) was to leave at 4am on Saturday morning, so the girls would be sleeping for most of the ride, maybe stop for breakfast, and roll up to Dad’s house at around 9:30am.  So, Ryan was supposed to sleep over Friday night so I could shake him violently at 3:15am.  He’d shower, we’d pack the car up and go.  Except…

Bad Chinese food + partying with friends + adult beverages = Ryan being violently ill and vomiting the entire way to my house.  He arrived, vomited some more, took a shower, threw his bags in my trunk, and collapsed in the front seat with his head in Rembot’s sand castle bucket.  Rookie.

By the time we pulled out of my driveway, it was 8:45am.  Sooooo, my impeccable itinerary?  Obviously shot.  Rembot and Shark are wide awake in the backseat, clutching their bears and blankets, while Uncle Ry made crazy dinosaur noises dry-heaving into the sand castle bucket.

Oh, here’s a fun fact about me.  I get motion sick – super easily.  Cars?  Trains?  Vans?  Planes?  On a boat?  With a goat?  A wave of nausea will hit me – I clutch my stomach, stick my head between my knees, and hope that it’s all over soon.  I don’t generally get sick while I’m driving – but it’s been known to happen.  This is why people generally do not enjoy traveling with me.  That, and because I like to do a seated stir-the-pot dance when a good song comes on the radio.

And I’m sitting next to Ryan, who is making ungodly noises while defiling a sand toy.  (RIP sand castle bucket)  I clap my hand over my mouth, and turn up the radio to drown out the noises.

“Ryan, you’ve got to stop.”
“Really?  REALLY.  I’ve got to stop vomiting?  But, ROO, it’s just SOOOOO FUN.”  {wretches into bucket}

“Mommy, what’s Uncle Ry doooing?”
“He’s learning life lessons, honey.”

“Do you want me to get you some Gatorade?”
“That depends.  Do you want to see me puke up some Gatorade?”

Four and a half hours.  And then we hit traffic (because we didn’t leave at 4am – as stated in The Plan).  Mercifully, all three of them passed out at one point, leaving me to silence and New Jersey.  Of course, I had been up since 3am – AS OUTLINED IN THE PLAN – so I was starting to get a little drowsy.  Rest stop time.  And for the girls who were starting to get cranky?  Chicken nugget time.

“SWEET BABY MOSES GET THOSE CHICKEN NUGGETS AWAY FROM MY FACE BEFORE I PUKE ALL OVER THE VINCE LOMBARDI REST STOP PARKING LOT.”

We pulled into Dad’s driveway at about 2:00pm.  The girls were happy, Ryan was suddenly feeling better, and I fought the urge to curl up into the fetal position until someone brought me candy and a soda.  Our stay ended up being nice – albeit a little tiring.

We had to run an errand for my dad, and Ryan discovered a product called the Reacher.  It’s a long stick with a claw at the end.  You grip the handle, and the claw opens up and grabs whatever you want it to grab.  So, because we’re twelve years old, we started lining shampoo bottles up in the middle of the Kmart aisle to see how easily the reacher could grab them.  And then harder objects, like packets of stickers and dishwashing gloves.  And then babies.

And then we left before the kind employees at Kmart could ask us to leave.

When the weekend was almost over, a couple hours before we were scheduled to head home, my dad and his wife had some friends over.  One of them?  A rather intoxicated, very pretty 39 year old woman who decided to try to get her swerve on with my brother.

“What’s your name?  It’s Ryan?  How old are you?  22 next month?  Oh, you’re a BABY.  Come toast with me, Baby.”

So Ryan dutifully walked over and they clinked wine glasses and it was all rather amusing until she started hugging him frequently and pouring more wine into his glass.

I started miming crazy motions in Ryan’s direction.  {points to him – mimes eating lo mein with chopsticks – sips fake wine glass – clutches stomach – puffs out cheeks – starts fake vomiting}  Actually?  I’m not sure how I performed all of those stellar moves without anyone seeing but Ryan.

Ryan furrowed his eyebrows and mouthed “You’re. so. stupid.”  Nevertheless, he delicately removed woman’s arm from around his shoulders, put his wine glass down, and announced that it was probably time to hit the road.  See?  Older sister?  Smart.

The New Plan was to leave at 7pm, the girls’ regularly scheduled bedtime – so they’d fall asleep and not be super needy during the trek home.  It mostly worked, except Rembot didn’t fall asleep.

And I forgot that I’m a bird and I pass out when someone turns the lights out.

I gained about 3 pounds ALONE on the snacks I ingested in an effort to keep myself awake.  Also?  If you got crank called last night, that was me… hoping your anger would be enough to buy me about five more minutes of wake time.

We stopped at another rest stop in Jersey – so Rembot and I could hit the bathroom and grab more snacks.  I pounded ice cream and ginger quail.  (NOTE: About 8 years ago, I had surgery and the drugs made me super loopy.  I was in bed, happily drugged, when Ryan asked if I needed anything.  I requested a glass of ginger quail.  Since then, and forever more, ginger ale will be known as ginger quail.  And sometimes?  The holy ginger grail.  Let it be so.)

We turned up some Run DMC on the radio and took turns being Rev Run and DMC.  And we poured a little ginger quail out for Jam-Master Jay.  “It’s Tricky” only kept me wide awake for so long…

“Quick, Ry.” {blinks – opens eyes really wide – leans forward – clutches steering wheel with both hands}
“Yes.”
“Hand me four potato chips, two Twizzlers, and open up that bottle of ginger quail.”
“You got it.”
“Wait.” {mentally counts calories and considers recent weight loss} “Make that one Twizzler.”
“But I already took two Twizzlers out of the bag!”
“RYAN I CAN ONLY EAT ONE TWIZZLER.”
“WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO WITH THIS EXTRA TWIZZLER?!”
“….”
“Fine.  You know what?  I’ll just take that empty ginger quail can, and this Twizzler and….”

It’s still hanging from my visor.  You know.  Nostalgia.