Posted by Roadtrippingma on Sep 30, 2010 in Road Tales | 1 comment
I’m not against cursing. In fact, everyone needs to drop the f-bomb once in a while. It’s an invigorating release of pent up anger or frustration that just can’t be achieved by yelling Phooey! But I do not appreciate hearing others rattle off one curse after another in every day language. Generally, this is not a problem. Since I am often accompanied by at least one of my young kids, adults responsibly clip their trucker talking habits lest the ears of childhood become blemished by such criminal vocabulary. Most adults understand that curses, crude jokes or sexual references are reserved for wine-induced dinner talk among friends (with the kids playing in the basement.)
Unfortunately, the radio has no such compunction about offending young ears. I guess musicians assume that kids under the age of twelve are still listening to Raffi or Barney. I wish. My youngest son, now six years old, is enamoured with all songs Top 40. The trashier the song, the more he seems to love it. It is unnerving to hear a sweet looking little boy belt out lyrics like, “Boys try to touch my junk!” And I’m pretty sure he thinks Katie Perry is actually referring to real popsicles when she sings California Girls (Lord, I hope so anyways.) I find so many songs offensive that our family minivan has oftentimes turned into a battleground as I flip stations to find the most suitable music.
“Leave it!” my boys will shriek, “I LOVE that song!”
“It’s rude,” I’ll respond, “You shouldn’t be singing about this kind of stuff, much less KNOW about it.”
“No, we love it, we love it,” they’ll beg, my youngest always the loudest, his eyes filling with tears. “Turn it back!”
The problem with a car is that a screaming six year old cannot be sent to his room for a time-out and there’s no chance of reasoning with him when I have to focus on that BMW I’m about to ram into or the yellow light I’m racing through. So my choice almost always comes down to: Do I listen to him freak out for the next ten minutes while I’m driving or do I just turn back to the song? Usually the song wins (with my own f-bomb scratching at my throat to come out.)
At least the radio is kind enough to bleep out the curses. But to filter out the songs about sex and drunkenness (gosh there’s a lot of them out there), I need to download hand-picked songs. That’s when I realize that the songs that seemed “safe” are filled with swear words. Little Lion Man is a fantastic song that I loved hearing on the radio. I put it on a disc and listened to it with the kids. I haven’t gotten around to counting how many times it sings the f-word. I’ll let you know when I do. And, we learned that Damn, she’s a sexy Bitch, not a sexy chick — nothing like your neighbourhood Whore? Gee kids, let’s have a sing-along!
There’s no winning this fight. The kids wanna sing. And heck, so many of these tunes are catchy! We’ve created a compromise and the kids have agreed to use their own bleeps. I just shrug my shoulders and smile when I hear my son belt out one of his favourite songs:
“When you see my face, hope it give you hah, hope it give you hah! When you walk my way hope it give you hah, hope it gives you hah!”
Oh hell, what’s a mom to do?
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Posted by Roadtrippingma on Sep 2, 2010 in Road Tales | 0 comments
The boys have seen a lot of road this summer. I asked them what was their favourite part of road tripping. It wasn’t the family comraderie, or the cultural exposure, nor was it the thrill of seeing more of their country. My two older boys admitted happily that the video games were the best part. Ouch. Am I letting them spend too much time staring at their mini screens so that they’re missing out on the scenery right outside their windows? Perhaps. But it’s hard to resist the quiet that accompanies their preoccupation with graphic images floating before their eyes.
My youngest son, however, spoke up after his brothers. “I liked seeing all the things, Mom.”
He is, of course, the one who cares the least for video games. On the other hand, he’s also the one who asks every 3o minutes, “How much longer till we get there?”
Regardless of whether my kids soaked in every moment of every experience we had throughout the road trips, the memories that matter most, that will sink into their very characters, are those of spending time together. And that, my fellow road warriors, is going to happen with or without the DS Nintendos.
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Posted by Roadtrippingma on Aug 21, 2010 in Packing the car, Road Tales | 0 comments
As the parent of three boys ten years and under, I’ve had my share of cleaning up kid vomit. My eldest, who has a flair for the dramatic, tended to spew across carpet before even taking a single step toward the toilet. “I couldn’t help it,” he’d cry as I gasped at the pink tinged splash that now accented their white bedroom rug. I understand. Kids have delicate stomachs and the difference between hunger pangs and nausea is not quite apparent to them until they’re tweens.
Our Montana minivan is as much a barfing receptacle as our bedroom floors. And, what may appear to be a perfectly healthy child at the start of the trip could, in fact, metamorphose into a faucet of scrambled food. Unfortunately, there are really no ways to prevent nausea (other than to slip Gravol into their peanut butter sandwiches, but let’s not go there.) Thankfully, there is a way to prevent the worst part of throwing up - the clean up.
We always pack a barf pitcher. Known by most families as a juice pitcher. It has come in handy several times over the past few years when one of the kids has claimed a sore tummy. “I feel like I’m gonna barf,” is the preferred statement uttered by my kids at least once every couple of hours in the minivan. I will reach behind the drivers’ seat and grab the pitcher. “Use this if you need to throw up, ” I’ll calmly advise the sick one. The precaution provides peace of mind, even if the likelihood of the complainer filling it is close to zero.
Our past road trip through the Maritimes, I was beginning to think the pitcher was no longer a necessary item on our packing list. No one had actually thrown up in the van in five years. However, during the final leg of our drive out of the Maritimes and into Maine, the undulating curves of the road proved too much for our six year old.
He warned us of his predicament and, as usual, we pass along the clean pitcher and told him to use it if necessary. After six episodes of vomiting, the pitcher was half full and the car reeked like a bad hangover. When he finally had emptied his insides, we pulled over the side of the road and cleaned out the container with a bottle of water and some wipes.
The clean up took less than two minutes and our car didn’t suffer a speck of vomit. I’ll never question the value of a barf pitcher again.
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Posted by Roadtrippingma on Aug 16, 2010 in Road Tales | 2 comments
Whenever I told friends that my family was embarking on a road trip out East, the most vocal proponents of the Maritimes were those who once lived there. Their eyes would light up as they proceeded to share one of their favourite memories… digging for clams, tapping their toes to folksy tunes, or sitting at the beach watching waves roll in. It certainly helped fuel my own excitement about the wonders of this culture of which I’d been so deprived.
They proved correct, in most instances. The beaches were beautiful from Nova Scotia, to Cape Breton, and of course, PEI. Buying lobster straight off a boat topped our list of seafood thrills (of which there were many.) Bon fires at night, mussel bakes, and the gentle Gaelic lilt of soft spoken Cape Bretoners were just a few of the experiences that painted a charming portrait of maritime life. However, we were never convinced that these simple Eastern folk were a friendlier breed than the rest of Canada (or, at least Ontario.) Sure, the hotel staff was courteous (it’s their job) and we didn’t come across a snooty waiter at any restaurants. But based on what we’d been told, we’d expected personal invitations inside people’s homes where they would share their family’s history over a bowl of homemade chowder.
About five days into our trip, we both came to a similar conclusion: the friendly scale remained static from Ontario to Nova Scotia (well, it did dip slightly in Quebec City, but isn’t that part of their culture?) We’d been slightly disappointed after all that we’d been promised, but shrugged our shoulders and patted our Ontario backs. Torontonians weren’t so miserable after all, it appeared. But then I drove through a small town called Liverpool.
Liverpool is a five-minute drive from White Point Resort, where we stayed. It boasted two grocery stores, a liquor store, a few fast food restaurants, and a thriving telemarketing business (where employees loitered outside the front door with smokes every time we drove by.) We attempted a stroll along its small downtown but quickly realized the stores weren’t all that quaint and that there seemed to be a general contempt for visitors. The local Home Hardware sold derogatory “Caution: tourists” signs a few feet from the checkout counter. I guess they’d never heard of the term don’t bite the hand that feeds you.
The early evening that I’d set out to Liverpool, our wine selection was quite diminished. I was elected by my husband to drive the minivan to town to pick up a few bottles, along with some groceries. While most of the route was quite straight forward, I was unsure at a couple of intersections and found myself having to make a three-point turn a few minutes from the grocery store. As is so often the case, when I began the u-turn, there were no cars in sight. However, at the “second” point in the turn, a car emerged. It was gunning toward me, as if to ensure that I would force it to slow down, thereby offer the driver an opportunity to be pissed off.
As I completed the third point in my turn, I lifted my left hand in thanks to the driver who’d been forced to slow down. With my thule carrier atop the minivan, coated in bumper stickers from various cities and states, I figured he could appreciate my predicament – ”We’ve all been there! Hope you find what you’re looking for!” Not so.
As I waved with a smile, my periphery vision caught a young man’s face sticking out of his window as he yelled as loud as he could, “Fuckin’ Foriegner!” I slowly lowered my hand and kept driving. Perhaps he hadn’t noticed the cargo carrier on my van. Or the Ontario license plate – y’know that province that is part of Canada? Maybe he’d mistaken my wave for an ancient language only known to a dwindling Zimbabwean tribe. I don’t know. But for one who has travelled through Europe, Asia, and the United States, the first time I’d ever been called a foreigner was in my own country. It was disheartening.
I realize I cannot and should not base my impression of all Maritimers on this one particularly miserable individual, but he certainly eliminated any residual romantic notions of meeting those fine, chit-chatting, small town Maritimers that I’d heard so much about. Or maybe it was just Liverpool.
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Posted by Roadtrippingma on Aug 3, 2010 in Gadgets, Packing the car | 0 comments
My six year old son has a habit of complaining about back pain within ten minutes of sitting in his booster seat. I sympathize with him since my back, too, suffers chronic discomfort if I’m stuck in the bucket seat of our Montanna for more than an hour.
In fact, spending a day strapped to a seat with abysmal lumbar support is a challenge to any human body’s tolerance for discomfort. The act of sitting for any period of time applies more pressure on the back than any other position. So, while strapped inside a car, any opportunity to lift the rear end off of a seat is a help. Today’s seatbelt laws (that fortunately promote the safety and well-being of passengers) hinder us from allowing our bodies to find the positions are most comfortable for our bodies.
A lumbar support pillow is a relatively effective measure to prevent the tension that results in the lower back from sitting. There are many brands and types of pillows on the market. One convenient option is to purchase an inflatable pillow. That way, each passenger’s pillow can be deflated and folded away during short drives and, depending on the size of the child, can be inflated to various pressures to suit his or her body frame.
I recently started using an inflatable travel support pillow called Back Booster. With some experimentation, I was able to find the most comfortable level of inflation. When fully inflated, my upper back couldn’t rest against the top of the seat. However, when inflated less than half its capacity, the pillow offered just enough support to mould into my lower back, thus allowing me to maintain a proper posture. The same level of inflation turned out to fit perfectly for my six year old, as well. His complaints stop abruptly as soon as he slips the pillow his back.
A less effective, but easy alternative is to place a rolled towel behind the lower back. Ideally, the driver should adjust the seat to be as straight as possible and close enough to the steering wheel to prevent leaning forward to reach the controls. Just as important to spinal health, is to take regular breaks outside of the car. Every few hours, pull into a rest stop for a stretch of the legs.
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