Considering a Flight to Newark

When you move cross country, a few things change.  One of those is getting back home for vacation.  Gone is the direct flight.  Now there are connections, and more expensive connections.  We fly Southwest: yes, we are those kind of people.  They just started flying into Newark, and with 4 people flying the price differential was significant enough for us to fly there instead of our usual Albany.  I guess it all starts there.

This will work toward our advantage in at least one way.  Since we are vacationing earlier than usual, we’ll be joining the extended family in their annual trip to the shore.  Don’t call it the ‘beach’- I get admonished each time I do.  Maybe I should just call it the playa.  I don’t want to think I’ve joined the show Jersey Shore.  I may be an Italian-American, but I’m not a Guido and I don’t have lots of gold jewelry, bad clothes and a worse accent.

It was a short night.  I didn’t sleep exceedingly well, and was actually up before my clock radio started playing Charlie Peacock at 5:15 (I don’t have Quadrophenia on tape, so…).  Since CavWife was in the shower, I spent a few downstairs with some tea and the internet.  Then a quick shower and I got dressed.  I decided to wear “My Lucky Underwear”.  Yes, it literally says that on the underwear between the little shamrocks.  By the end of the trip I wasn’t feeling quite so lucky.

One of the joys of flying out of Tucson is that the security lines are short, so we didn’t feel pressured when we left 15 minutes later than usual.  This was a death knell in Orlando.  Not so in Tucson.  All was going well until I took CavSon to the bathroom.

When we got into the stall, I didn’t see the other side of the toilet.  He, being the person he is, had to go over there and hop up.  It was after he got down that I noticed the sea of pee over there.  And the flip-flop prints he was leaving behind.  I’m invested here, sadly, and don’t want some other poor slob to fall into the trap.  Yes, I cleaned it.  My lucky day.  And then I washed his flip-flops so he wouldn’t share the pee joy with the rest of the airport.  Apparently I might be a rare breed.

Earlier CavGirl said she wanted to sit with me on the plane.  But when you travel with 2 car seats (yes, those people too) such a thing is not guaranteed.  It is a pain to travel with car seats.  We put them on a luggage rack to make travel thru the airport easier.  But you have to dismantle the thing at security.  And our rack has suddenly developed an issue with the wheel so setting it up requires both hands and kneeling down.  Then, of course, this contraption doesn’t fit down the aisle of the plane.  Then we have to split them up so we don’t decapitate any unsuspecting passengers as we make our way down the aisle.  I miss the days when families with young children boarded before all passengers but those with blue passes due to infirmity.  Far fewer people to potentially decapitate and you didn’t have to make your way to the back of the plane unless you wanted to.  But at least I’m not paying to check 4 bags.

Back to something closely resembling a point.  I had problems trying to rig her car seat.  We use them because we have to bring them anyway, and the kids actually stay seated through the flight.  The one time we didn’t use them, CavGirl was up about every 20 minutes wanting to explore the plane.  So, CavWife and I had to switch off in the process which means different rows (which means we don’t have a meaningful conversation the entire trip across the country).  This meant that I sat with CavSon and his recently washed flip-flops.

He’s a piece of work, that boy.  I was trying to enjoy more Charlie Peacock music on my iPod (again, thank you to the person who anonymously gifted me with this) and read.  He kept interrupting me, which is rather pointless since I can’t understand 75% of what he says.  He stopped eating his blueberry bagel with about 1/3 left.  Then he started playing with his water.  But I was beginning to read the book CavWife game me for Father’s Day- The Original Curse which is about the 1918 World Series, not the sin of Adam.  I became aware of this fact when I felt the ice cold water penetrating my pants, and Lucky underwear.  I then noticed it was also on my iPod.  I froze- not thinking “the Lord gives and the Lord takes away”, but “you’ve got to be freakin’ kidding me!”  This is not my kitchen where I can easily get up and grab a towel to clean up.  I’m trapped on the inside seat looking like I’ve become incontinent and unable to stem the flow of water.  I’m trying save the book and dry off the iPod.  Thankfully a steward quickly provided paper towels.  The iPod was saved.

My pants were mostly dry by the time we got to Denver, but not the lucky underwear which made for some discomfort for the early stages of our layover.  Somehow I got the task of taking the kids for a walk to get ants out of the pants.  This made listening to the Choir on the iPod difficult for a few reasons.  First, CavGirl didn’t want to go for a walk and kept talking to me, and CavBoy was drawn to escalators and moving sidewalks of which there are many in Denver.  So I probably kept yelling at him- “No!, This way!, Stop!”  We made our way to the observation deck where it was decidedly less populated.

Upon coming back, CavWife proclaimed that an old Word of Life friend now lived in Denver a mere 20 minutes away and was coming to see her.  “Ah…..”  Off she went leaving me, again, with 2 kids.  One of those kids is Miss Anxious, constantly asking me when mommy is getting back and if she’ll make it back in time (though I was wondering that as well since security was surely a longer line than in Tucson).  The other is Mr. Destruction who has to be behind me whacking his cars and trains against the window.  I know all the other people pitied me.  Or despised me.

After moving beyond the security checkpoint CavWife decided the line to get back in was too long to meet her friend and headed back.  She got back about 5 minutes before we started boarding.  So I had a partner for the car seat shuffle.  This time I did sit with CavGirl.  Only problem was that CavSon actually napped this time (Lucky CavWife, unlucky me with the Lucky Underwear).  CavGirl however didn’t want me to listen to Jean-Luc Ponty or read The Original Curse.  She wanted me to answer a thousand questions and read a hundred books to her.  Books that she can read, mind you.

But, she didn’t spill water on me.  CavWife recently rediscovered our Southwest drink coupons.  I was having a beer- I needed a beer at this point.  Coupon in hand I was ready to pounce upon the next stewardess to come by.  Only they didn’t, and couldn’t due to turbulence.  Finally, they were up and about.  Being a beer snob, the only reasonably acceptable option was a Heineken.  I was sure I could resist the urge to dance and play with the other passengers, so I asked if there was time for one.  Nope.  Huh?  But 10 minutes later she reappeared with one in hand asking if I wanted to have it.  “Sure”, and I handed over my coupon.  Now was when the Captain came on the intercom to announce that our time in the holding pattern was over and we would be descending shortly.  I had to down a beer in 5 minutes.  I hadn’t done this since college.  But I didn’t want to waste the coupon (yes, I’m cheap!).

As we de-plane I think of the last time I was at the Newark airport.  I arrived in December 2001 to marry CavWife.  Travel was much easier then.  No car seats, no million questions, no desire to listen to an iPod, no drink coupons.  But we were off to the home my wife grew up in- the first time my kids have been there.

The plan was to have the kids start off in separate beds and put them in the same one when they were asleep.  Yeah, that didn’t happen.  He was rolling around like it was play time, and she was sobbing.  This is what they do when they are tired.  So I now have to share a bed with CavGirl.  She’s suddenly excited about this.  She’s way over on my side whispering in my ear (see, it never stops but one day I’ll miss it), petting my arm, getting up to tell her mom how excited she is…. I realize as I wake up 20 times during the night that I, with a bad back, am on the lousy mattress and have an insufficient pillow.  Will tomorrow be a migraine day?  We’ll see.  After all, the adventure has only just begun.