Riley and I are in Boston to see my folks and go to my cousin’s wedding in New Hampshire this weekend.
Why Riley? I made an executive decision to take one child with me on this weekend adventure. You see, I’ve been at 39,00 feet with a lunatic child before and I saw no reason to increase the odds of that happening again. That, and I’m lazy. Two kids on a plane is lot more work than one kid on a plane. After careful consideration, Mike and I decided that six-year-old Dylan would appreciate a special weekend with Daddy more than four-year-old Riley would appreciate a weekend without his Mama. Thus, Riley became my travel buddy (even though he’s is the lunatic I referred to earlier in this paragraph).
About a half hour before boarding the plane, I texted Mike that Riley was doing awesome at the airport. Mike’s reply was something like, “That’s great but wait until you’re in the air for an hour.” He was most likely right, but I refused to give in to pessimism, especially when our time at the airport was going so swimmingly. That, and what other choice did I have?
I’m happy to report that it was a great, uneventful, tantrum-less flight. In fact, the entire day was awesome. Here’s why:
1. Travelling with kids is like traveling with first class tickets. There was a HUGE line for security when we checked our bag in Ft. Lauderdale, and because of my trophy toddler, we bypassed all of the madness for the family line, which had absolutely no wait. The Mama in line behind me and I joked that our kids made us VIP travelers. True dat!
2. Airport bathrooms are, well, airport bathrooms. BUT, Riley didn’t touch anything he wasn’t supposed to, and he quite enjoyed the automatic flush. “How did it know?” he asked me.
3. Finding these magnets – made for one another – at the terminal kiosk made me smile.
(I didn’t buy them.)
4. Kids are money pits, especially at airports, but Riley’s airport shopping spree made him happy, which helped make our flight great, uneventful, and tantrum-less.
Shopaholic Mini! The surfboard key chain is for Dylan and the bedazzled flip flop key chain is for Daddy. Ha!
5. Dora on board!
Happy Riley.
6. Dunks!
Happy Mama.
7. Two bags of animal cookies plus four Rice Krispies treats = great, uneventful, and tantrum-less flight.
8. As it turns out, one of my children might actually look like me. (A little bit, right?)
(That’s me on the left. Thanks for the super-duper bowl haircut, Mom!)
9. #Boston Strong. It feels good to be here and to see my parents and spend some one-on-one time with Riley. That, and it’s not too cold for my Floridian blood and everything is blooming. It’s bee-u-tiful.
10. I got a voice message from my endocrinologist that the nodule in my thyroid – the one with all of the damn, stupid, pink princess baby, f–king “concerning” attributes – the one that’s been consuming me and causing loads of crazy ass anxiety and stress – is BENIGN! My doctor called while we were in the air, so when we landed and I took my phone off of airplane mode, her glorious message was waiting for me.
Ah. Deep breath. Now there’s plenty of room in my head to worry about something else.
See, it was an awesome day.
p.s. Thank you for all of your kind words and concern about my stupid thyroid.
The Runaway Mama by Jen Gregory 