Although we have strung together a few road trips during the pandemic, we had stayed away from flying. It was a real bummer, because we missed out on a lot of free flying before my son turned two years old. We had six trips tentatively planned before his second birthday that all got cancelled. Now he, all 25 pounds of him, is as expensive of a ticket as I am. Seems unfair, but we were glad to have that seat for him instead of trying to maintain that monster on our lap.
Oh yeah, we flew from Florida to Colorado to see friends. Road tripping with a child is awful, and guess what? Flying ain't great either. If anyone has access to a private plane that you would like to gift me in exchange for the gift of these words, I would gladly take that tradeoff. That seems like a way better way to fly, but I'll likely never have that luxury.
So instead, we got to the airport, and for the first time in my life, I paid for the fancy long-term parking as opposed to parking off site and being shuttled to the airport in order to save $5 a day. But we needed to make things as easy as possible. Parking was great. Walking into the airport, also great. Getting into the airport, not as great, because then we had to mask up. Some kids have been out and about enough to get used to wearing a mask; our child has not. We've taken him to stores to get him accustomed to the mask, but he's really only worn it for half hour periods of time. Trying to get him to keep his mask on while waiting for a flight was a challenge, and we were fighting a losing battle.
We tried to give him breaks by feeding him with his mask off, and that seemed to help quite a bit. It's just that once we got done waiting for the flight to board, we then had to worry about keeping it on for 3.5 hours, which just wasn't going to happen. Still, he at least made it through takeoff, and he was so damn excited about going to Colorado (something he had been talking about nonstop for a month) that he was super well-behaved. A few rocky spots, but nothing notable, and nothing notable is one of the greatest wins a parent can experience.
Was he slightly over things when we got off the plane? Yeah, and honestly, so was I. I just dealt with it better than he did, since he decided it would be a hilarious prank to keep ripping my mask off for entertainment purposes. As far as I know I did not get infected with Covid-19 during these short periods, so no harm, no foul.
Then, the trip went great. Nothing fancy to mention. The man played hard, hiked hard, and woke up hard as his wake up times were 2:45, 3:20, and 3:37. That 3:37 was glorious, which just shows how awful time zones can be.
Much like everyone I have ever encountered, the trip back is never as much fun as the trip to the destination. Hanging at the airport was not the most pleasant as he didn't really enjoy waiting around; he kind of enjoyed walking around, but he hated wearing his mask. We decided to pick and choose our battles a lot more on the way back and got him to wear his mask for boarding the plane until takeoff. After that, it was free reign. If we had decided to fight the battle, we would have lost, and we would have had a lot more drama in our lives.
It also didn't help that the man was in desperate need for a nap but couldn't get comfortable enough to sleep on the plane. So he had some fits. He wanted to smash the backs of seats, which is fair, like, it's kind of hard to convince a two-year-old to only play this way, and not that way, and oh no, not that way either in a confined space. It sucks, and I felt bad for him. It was a constant struggle, and really, I have to write this from my wife's view, because he loves her more than me right now, so she is the one who really has to keep on top of him as Daddy just escalates things when he tries to help.
So we survived. We did it through episodes of Blaze and the Monster Machine. We did it through new cars and trucks as special surprises. We did it through magnets. We did it through books. We did it through art boards. We did it through stickers. Some of these things only occupied two minutes, but that got us two minutes closer to the goal, and as long as we could keep cycling, we could keep him moderately under control.
And we made it. We landed, got off the plane, grabbed our bags, and finally made it to the parking lot where we could all take our masks off and breathe a sigh of relief.
It was about as good as expected on the way out, and it was a challenge on the way back, but none of that is the important stuff. It's the in-between that we'll remember. Having my son see mountains, having him climb mountains, and just spending quality time with friends. That's what will stick with us years down the line. And that's why despite our struggles, we'll plan on doing it again.