by Patti
From the moment M and I met, we loved taking road trips together. I would take a big stack of magazines, a block of cheese, and a loaf of french bread, and off we'd adventure together.
Once S came into the picture, it was only natural to assume that we'd work her into our road tripping ways. After all, just because we now had a BABY didn't mean that that BABY had to cramp our style. Plus, S was a pretty easy-goin' baby, and we were lucky that she was of the "I love my car seat!" variety, so road trips? Should be a breeze! Right?
When S was about 8 months old, we decided to road trip it all the way to Colorado. We even decided to take my parents with us, because grandparents are, like, the best thing ever when you have a baby, so along with us they came. We decided it would be best to set out at night so that S could sleep through, and we, the adults, would take turns driving. We swung through the Taco Bell drive-thru first, and once we were are settled in with our Grande Chalupas, we hit the road.
The trip started out great. S was all chirpy and bubbly and adorable, and I sat in front with M while my parents drooled over their granddaughter in the back. A couple of hours in, S started getting wiggly. And then that wiggliness quickly morphed into all-out wailing. She seemed miserable, totally trapped in her straight jacket of a car seat. She kicked her legs and flailed her arms furiously. We were speeding along the expressway, and there was really no place to pull over. My parents desperately tried to calm her, but she just wouldn't calm down. So I did what I had to do: I flung myself over the seat into the back, squished in between S and my mom, and unloaded my boob from its harness and stuffed it into S's screaming mouth. Right there. In a speeding car. On the expressway. Next to my mom. AND MY DAD.
S immediately calmed down, and as soon as we could, we pulled over so I could change her and comfort her and attempt to erase the trauma of highway boob from everybody's brains.
The rest of the trip was a complete and total nightmare. The S we had known and loved all these months had apparently been tricking us into believing she was awesome. She was so NOT awesome on this trip. Highway boob became another frequent passenger on our doomed road trip, and S screamed her way across 4 states. On top of that, I totally broke the law several times by taking my screaming, squirming baby out of her car seat and desperately bouncing her up and down on my lap in a speeding car, but oh my HELL do the laws need to change. Law makers should all be forced to go on a road trip with a screaming baby.
Despite all of this, we made it. WE MADE IT. And though most of our visit was marred by the gnawing realization that, OH MY GOD, we totally had to drive BACK, the trip back actually ended up being absolutely perfect. Nary a scream silenced, nary a boob unleashed, nary a driver blinded.
