My youngest children like to kiss on the lips. I don’t know why. From the time they were born, I kissed their foreheads. I kissed their noses. I kissed their cheeks and their toes and their ticklish bellies. As soon as they started kissing back, it was on the lips. I think it’s sweet, but when it’s someone else’s child kissing you on the lips, it just seems wrong. Amy has regular kisses and she has “movie kisses” which are just like regular kisses, only longer. She puckers up and holds it on your lips beyond the point at which even family feels uncomfortable and awkward. One of my brothers comes to town about every other year. Because he is tolerant of even the most obnoxious behaviors, the children find him fascinating and love to test him out for reactions. On his most recent visit, Amy gave him a movie kiss. His deer in headlights expression hadn’t even faded when Evan approached him. My brother was understandably nervous and tense at the approach of the feral child. Evan looked at my brother. My brother looked back at him cautiously. Evan made that quirky smile that those who know him recognize as the signal that a plan has been formed. Evan leaned in and my brother tensed, his arms clearly prepared to block off any future movie kisses. Evan paused, grinned and licked my brother’s arm. When we saw my brother the next day, a typically hot southern summer day, he was wearing long sleeves.

If Turkey Creek had been designed to be walkable, they would not have the hordes of spoiled, thug wanna-be teenagers take over the property for drag races late at night. I am a Turkey Creek fan. I love to go there and people watch. I have just never understood why it wasn’t designed more intelligently. People should park their cars and walk everywhere in the complex. The people who approved the strip malls on either side of a highway design deserve to have the late night races all over their landscaped retail world.

I want to say kids will be kids. I want to say live and let live. I just can’t. This bothers me as a parent. The idea of unsupervised drag racing makes my mom alarms flash and ring. I don’t deny that my worry is fueled by the presence of two permit holders in our house. The awareness that all of my children’s peers are also permit holders has me dreaming of a large empty parking lot converted into an obstacle course for safe learning. My teens and their friends probably dream of joining in the late night races at Turkey Creek. I am acutely aware that we shun teens and deny them places to interact. I just don’t think that nitrous cars are a good way to socialize and impress. Turkey Creek needs to tear up that drag strip and replace it with a row of small shops and SIDEWALKS.

Sarah mocked my pre-sleepover lecture by summarizing it on a chalkboard.

While I listen to the middle school principal rant about the evils of technology year after year, I actively encourage my children to embrace technology and blogging. For children, blogging starts out as an online diary. It is a place where they can record their feelings at that moment in time. If they ever posted anything threatening to themselves or others, we would immediately intervene and get professional help. We wouldn’t just tell them to delete it and deny their feelings. That scenario hasn’t come up yet, but my children do sometimes make posts with words I don’t like them using. I allow it. Sometimes they whine and complain. I allow it. I don’t have to agree with them. They are allowed to have their own emotions, ideas and opinions. I think it’s much better that they be allowed to sort it all out in a blog post than forced to be keep everything unexpressed. I don’t want my children to go through life with a big blank smile on their faces, saying “everything is fine” when life is all about highs and lows. It is the lows that make the highs that much sweeter. As adults, we learn to filter who we share details of life with, but even as adults, we recognize the big, fat liars who are more superficial than a department store mannequin. Teenagers have enough problems without adults denying their feelings. If one of my children says they had a really cruddy day, they need a hug. They don’t need me telling them that their day doesn’t matter or that they are wrong. Their blog is their therapy couch. It’s where they get to let it all out. Validation is much more important than keeping up appearances.

Year after year, I read everyone’s accounts of their travels and adventures and thought I was fine in my happy little corner of the world. I still love where I am, but vacations are wonderful! From Evan’s first timid steps on the sand to his out of the blue declaration, “I am happy” midweek, this was a great week. It overshadowed his giant sand vomit in the bed and his impulsive assault on his sister’s shoulder with a large rock. He spent the week shrieking in terror every time anyone tried to apply sunscreen to his delicate white skin. As a result, he has some small pink splotches, but fared much better than I had imagined. Amy’s surprise that the ocean is salty and her inexhaustable play with the water splashing on the sand were entertaining enough to excuse her beach obsession with the body’s waste products. “Is that fish poop?” I wonder how many times I can retell the story of Amy squatting in the sand and peeing while she loudly informed everyone on the beach that “Uncle Dean said it’s okay to pee in the ocean” before she gets annoyed with me.

The sun touches Noah and he immediately turns brown. He paired off with other tweens on the beach and they ventured farther into the ocean than I was comfortable with them doing. By the end of the week, he was exhausted and eager to crawl back into his digital entertainment world. I’m giving him a few days of electronic abuse before I shove him back outside. Sarah started the week by wearing her clothes into the ocean. By Friday she was running all over the island, comfortable in only a bikini. As a result, she attracted some attention (and new facebook friends). The highlight of her week was a flight above the island as a special gift for being so helpful with her younger siblings. Tommy was a wild card. I didn’t know if the beach would be too much of everything for his senses. Allowed to self regulate, he did wonderfully. He loved the floating sensation in the ocean, but spent very little time relaxing on the beach. He declared the ocean exercise and the pool relaxation. He and Noah abused their indulgent Uncle with the dragons that lurk on the beach at night. Aunt Jeni and Uncle Dean were playmates for all of the children. Although Jeni and I shouldn’t be allowed to sit across from each other at meals because we misbehave when together, I think we agree that having a once a year trip for the entire family at which we celebrate ALL of the holidays and birthdays of the past year together would be perfect.

If I could change anything about the week, it would be having a giant tube slide from the chalet to the beach. How much fun would it be to toss yourself and your basket of towels down the slide and instantly be at the beach instead of trudging down several flights of stairs with 50 pounds of equipment every morning? Some sort of Swiss Family Robinson lift for getting the equipment back upstairs would be helpful. Also, I would have no televisions in the chalet. If we ever go again, I will absolutely be bringing a clothesline. The teeny-tiny washer and dryer combo in the chalet held about two beach towels per load. I would have had to spend the entire trip doing laundry if I hadn’t packed plenty of clothes for everyone. If I could have one thing different, it would be not ending the vacation with the scrubbing of two toilets and their respective bathrooms. Cleaning is the exact opposite of relaxing. I know that because I am now looking at a mountain of sandy clothes and shoes. I don’t care though. It was totally worth it. The neighbors enjoyed our vacation too. “It was soooo quiet in the cove last week.”

Our vacation pictures.
Jeni & Dean’s vacation pictures.

Amy’s bladder seems to go from empty to full in a millisecond. At home, the urgency is funny. In the car, it is even more comical as one parent tries to establish the amount of time we have to choose a stopping place while the other parent does time and distance studies in their head to identify the cleanest choices nearby. On a long trip down unfamiliar roads, the parents completely lose their sense of humor. After a few mad dashes into rest areas, restaurants and gas stations, Evan figured out that he wasn’t going to get let out of his car seat and be allowed the freedom to run that he constantly craves unless he chose the same excuse as Amy. At one rest stop, he declared his desire to go potty. “Really?” I joke that the boy cares about play far too much to be bothered by anything as inconvenient as maintaining dry britches, but hope springs eternal, so I took Evan in the bathroom. We stepped in the crowded little area and I didn’t even have Evan seated when the auto-flush did its’ thing. “I done.” Sigh. Maybe we should stop at outhouses. Evan might find them less scary.

We stopped for the night in Columbia and decided to spend some time at Columbia’s version of Turkey Creek so that I could replace the clothing item that vanished somewhere between the laundry basket and the suitcase. Sarah thought shopping with me would be more fun than younger sibling duties at the cookie store. An 60-something woman walked up to a store employee and began complaining in a completely frustrated voice. “Where can I find men’s underwear? Not thongs or boxers or anything with a pouch, just normal underpants.” Sarah began snickering and turning different shades of pink. The older woman went off on her quest with new directions from the clerk. “What’s the matter Sarah? Is the word underwear that embarrassing?” Sarah’s face turned crimson and she fell apart laughing so hard that tears flowed down her face. The clerk grinned from earlobe to earlobe. I wandered through the women’s lingerie department and Sarah trailed behind me with a steady stream of complaints. “Almost everything is white or yucky tan. Where’s the polka dots or stripes? This is the boring department.” I tried to explain about clothes not concealing bright colors, but Sarah didn’t really want an explanation. She just wanted to be contrary. I went in the dressing room and Sarah suddenly decided she would prefer to be chasing her younger siblings than in the dressing room with her mother. A few minutes later I was at the checkout waiting for the well dressed man buying underwear with his wife’s credit card for the prostitute in the store with him. It was just as well that Sarah missed that theater of the absurd. Even the store employee was embarrassed. Doug called me as I was paying the clerk. “Why did Sarah get embarrassed? How does she get underwear?” I explained that Sarah is visited by the underwear fairy whenever she needs bras or undies. They magically appear on her dresser and the undesired items are plopped on my desk to be returned to the store. I think that the underwear fairy just quit.

Doug asked me what time he should wake me so that we could get on the road. I looked at him oddly since I didn’t think I needed an alarm to be ready to leave the house at 10 in the morning. Doug looked at me like I was using a language he didn’t speak. “I thought we’d be on the road by 5 a.m.” My idea of a vacation does not include hurrying or schedules. We left the decision unmade and I resumed the hunting and gathering of equipment and clothes to pack. “Nobody touch anything on the kitchen table or the couch or this chair. I’m getting ready to pack.” “All my clothes are in that pile. What am I supposed to wear?” “Wear winter clothes.”

The three oldest children decided that they would stay up all night so that they could sleep the entire car ride. I didn’t think that was a good idea, but couldn’t put my finger on the reason why their idea bugged me. When they looked droopy at midnight, I ordered them to bed and they were too sleepy to protest. I continued packing until I reached a point where I could no longer count to 5 without losing my place. I crawled in the bed and Evan immediately demanded that he sleep in my bed. He spent the rest of the night doing gymnastics. I woke around 8 the next morning feeling like I hadn’t been to sleep yet. I dressed, finishing the packing and Doug finally decided to start loading the car at 10 a.m. The teens were still refusing to get out of bed. I recognized the problem with their up all night plan. They are too heavy to carry. What time was everyone up, dressed and ready? Noon.

Things my children will never experience during road trips:
*Gaps between radio stations (I love you XM).
*My father singing 50s gimmick songs (Tom Dooley, etc.) to keep himself awake.
*Potty breaks behind trees on barren stretches of road.
*Travel without music players and DVD players.
*Traveling without seatbelts.
*Sleeping in the back window.
*Sleeping on the floor.
*An open playpen in the back of the station wagon.

Things they need to experience:
*Stopping to read historic markers even if they don’t want to.
*Picnics along the way.
*Days when there are no classes, appointments or errands. Time is irrelevant.
*Beaches (Amy and Evan have no beach memories).
*Mom laughing instead of stressing.

I asked everyone to put everything they need for the vacation on the kitchen table. Evan, obviously, gets a free pass on this one. His idea of getting ready for anything is putting a matchbox car in each fist. Amy put out a pile of stuffed animals, her swimsuit and a pair of jeans. Noah put out three pairs of jeans and two t-shirts. Sarah put out two bikinis, 4 jammies and 15 complete outfits that didn’t match so that she could roll her eyes every time I questioned one of the choices. Tommy put out 8 pairs of underwear, sandals, jeans and three t-shirts. Doug was exempt from this exercise because he would wait until we are loading the car to throw 12 pairs of socks, 6 pairs of underwear, 6 swimsuits, 8 juggling clubs and an assortment of juggling balls in the car, without a suitcase. It’s best for everyone if I do all of the packing. Besides, it makes it easier to have a scapegoat when something gets forgotten.