There’s nothing like family togetherness during the holidays, especially when that togetherness takes place on I-95. For hours.
Of course, there are consolations. Everyone has at least one screen to look at. John Donne famously wrote that no man is an island, but clearly he never saw the inside of a minivan on a road trip.
Everyone is in his own world. No one talks, except occasionally to bellow, “THE MOVIE HAS NO SOUND!’ This is done at ungodly decibels, because their headphones are still on. And, it’s an emergency.
Other than that, though, it’s fairly peaceful, if you don’t mind basking in an unhealthy glow.
In our car, my son plays on his Nintendo DS, his twin sister watches a movie (or two or three), while our teenage daughter texts on her phone and listens to music.
Unfortunately, the pace of holiday traffic often makes electronics-induced nuclear meltdowns inevitable. Smoke begins to pour from our children’s frontal lobes. This is, of course, somewhat alarming. What is more alarming is the thought of turning everything off.
My husband had to face that dilemma alone this past Thanksgiving. I was already in NYC. My trip by train: 3.5 hours. His? 7.5 hours.
Evidently his journey was somewhat unpleasant.
I first realized that things had gone south when I received the following email from my 11-year-old daughter, who had gotten hold of her father’s iPad:
“It is now 6 o'clock and we are 40 miles from NYC. It has been FOREVER! We might be there around 7:00 or 7:30, which for me is even more than FOREVER! 🙁 It is very very very very very very very boring! The Sims game didn't work so I watched a movie, but I've seen them all! I love youuuuuuuu! 🙂 Bye!”
About 15 minutes later, the report from the front had become terse:
“You-know-who is being MEAN and Daddy is mad.”
Five minutes later, my son emailed:
“Daddy is threatening to throw my DS out the window. Help me.”
Uh-oh. My husband’s cell phone had died, so I did all I could: I sent them an email urging calm. And then I ordered a glass of a nice syrah at the wine bar where I was hiding waiting.
What? Was that wrong?
Sometime later, when the chamber of horrors — I mean minivan — pulled up, peace had been restored.
My husband no longer seemed inclined towards operatic gestures. My son gave me a watery smile – his DS had merely been confiscated. (He’d somehow managed to hold onto to the iPad.)
Holiday travel can test your mettle, and make you question your will to live. But as Winston Churchill once said, “If you’re in hell, keep going.”
Never forget that on the other side of the electronic overload, the boredom, the threats, the recrimination and the tears, is the journey’s end — the people you’ve traveled to see — and perhaps best of all, the moment when you finally get out of the car.
