Travel day went well, I think. The kids were excited the
entire time, and had absolutely no trouble with flying.
Alan is a rock, and
very little seems to phase him, so that wasn’t a concern. Blueberry’s patience
started to wear out around dinner time, though to be fair to her, I realized
she was fussing at the restaurant because her old brother and her dad had
stolen both activity placemats to play with. After a short time on the second
and longer flight, Blueberry was fast asleep—which was a blessing, because we
lifted off about an hour after her bedtime.
On the second flight, Max kept reaching out across the aisle
to hold my hand. I figured he was nervous because the second plane was so much
bigger than the first, with louder sounds and way more people. I kept
swallowing my own fear of flying to look over at him with a big smile, which he
returned every time. On my other side, I had Alan’s hand in a deathgrip and
every bubble of turbulence, I grabbed on tighter. But for Max’s sake, my other
hand was soft and gentle and comforting.
It was about halfway through our ascent that I looked over
at Max and realized: I wasn’t comforting him…he
was comforting me. Kids are smarter
than they look. I asked Alan what was up, and he said Max had figured it out,
and had decided to take care of me on the flight.
I fought back the sappy tears that started to tingle in my
eyes. That such a tiny little human would try to comfort a full-grown woman…that
I had earned that level of affection from this boy…the only reason I didn’t
blubber was because I’ve cried on airplanes and I know my ears will never
unblock.
After picking up our Ford Explorer from the valet (which by
the way, is a WAY cooler ride than the minivan, and I felt like a hiphop star
or something), we set out of the hotel. We got into the hotel at about 3:00am
home time (midnight local time), and the kids were exhausted but wired.
Eventually everyone drifted off…then we all woke up, like clockwork, at 9:00am
home time, 6:00am local time. I barked at everyone to go back to sleep, but
then Max came over and whispered that he couldn’t do it, and I said I couldn’t
either, so we all lay in the bed together and completely failed to sleep.
Blueberry is currently refusing to put on anything other
than a pair of underwear, and I’m looking over maps. We’re off to Granville
Island, then back here for Blueberry’s nap, when I suspect we will all end up
passing out and further giving in to the jetlag.
But I swear I can smell the ocean outside, even though I can’t
see it yet, and that’s super exciting.
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