We’re en route. Chicago bound. And it’s just the two of us. I love our children but I also absolutely love when we have time to get back to basics. But things. Well. They’ve changed. When we travelled to Chicago a decade ago to meet our first nephew over Fall Break, it was a bit different. First of all, Planters still made those delicious cheez balls in the cylindrical container. And also we barely had the radio on because I had loaded up on “question” books {ummmm, yeah…and Adam stayed with me. Bless his heart}.
We are going partially because the Husker game is at Northwestern and so Chicago seemed like a logical weekend excursion but mostly, we’d arranged for grandma and grandpa E to spend the weekend with the boys and decided we’d take our chance and run.
We often struggle at this point. When we have time without the boys, the first thing that comes to mind is, “we could clean the entire storage area, garage and watch a weekend marathon of Mad Men in our own house”. It’s tempting to use time independent of our children to dive deep into the long list of to-dos that seem to amass once your time becomes more taken with little tots. But as I mentioned recently, we also recognize our need to have time with one another, away from the to-do lists, the errands and the reminders of reality.
And truly, for this, I thank God for my husband. Adam does a marvelous job of pushing me to let go. Let go of all the household obligations that will inevitably still be there when we get back. He encourages us to get out of the “office”, as I’ve dubbed it and to focus on fun. And he helps me to relinquish that need for control that seems to grow inside your uterus along with each babe.
There are certainly times where we can’t do this. A weekend away is much trickier when there is a babe on the boob and the alarm has to be set every three hours for pumping out the pillows. And time during the week can be extremely stressful when you don’t have anyone to care for your children during everyone else’s office hours. And at times, getting away, even just for one sleep can seem like more work than its worth but in the end, I’m always refreshed and thankful.
So what has changed, one may ask… Well…
I find that we’re both content to sit in silence. And this is good. Silence is golden and when you get used to the constant chatter of children, it’s nice to have a reprieve every so often. Sometimes the silence actually feels creepy. But for the most part, it’s kind of nice.
I told Adam that I needed to go potty. Yeah. Potty. It’s now a fixture of my vocabulary and I’ve no doubt that my use of this word and this word alone makes me wildly sexy to the love of my life.
We find ourselves saying things to each other in “Barrett-And-Jonah-ese”. These things include but are not limited to: “noooo. Don’t say thaaaat”, “airplane, daddy, airplane”, “is this the song where we rock out and pound” and “I’m not silly. I’m a honyocker”.
We did not bring a single mixed cd on this trip. When we did this a decade back, I burnt several “road trip mix” discs complete with love songs and music that I liked to sing out loud to. As I type, we are listening to Pop2k playing “my humps” and we each intermittently dance and shake what our mommas gave us. No mixed cd could possibly have provided this much entertainment.
We are in a “family vehicle” not a two door Berretta with a black “bra” to cover a dent. And I’m sure our gas mileage will be significantly different.
We have no real plans. We may go to the game. We may go to a “Husker Bar”. We may meet up with peeps. We may not. We have a hotel room and that’s about as far as we’ve gotten. With a normal weekend consisting of scheduling around naps, mealtimes and ones who wake with the rising sun, we’ve abandoned planning and are just going with the flow.
And of course, the biggest change is that we have two people at home who we will think of every minute we’re away.
Changes aside, we are still two kids in love with one another. Now we just have two kids of our own. And diapers in the console, hot wheels under the seats and Wet Ones on hand.
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