Logistics

We’ve got a trip to SoCal coming up this Friday…and I’m completely unprepared. The whole thing is shaping up to be one logistical nightmare after another; to wit:

1. I’ve got to pack everything we need into two smallish bags, because
2. Our car is already packed to the gills with two car seats and a scooter in the back, and because
3. We’re going to have to negotiate two airports with a baby, a toddler, a scooter, a suitcase, a soft-sided bag, a car seat, and a diaper bag, which will likely work out something like: me + baby in Bjorn (perchance to fall flat on my face again and bang out whatever brains I missed the last time we fell together) with rolling suitcase and toddler carseat; M. with toddler on lap, soft-sided bag under his scooter seat, and diaper bag slung on the back of the scooter seat. We can carry no more than this.
4. We also have to get all of the above to the offsite car rental office, which involves getting everyone/thing onto the shuttlebus; heavy scooter included.
5. I also have to figure out how to breastfeed on the airplane. I’m thinking this is simply easier for women with nice, slopey breasts. Mine are huge and round; juggling them is a trick even when I’m mostly naked from the waist up. I’m not sure how I’m going to manage to just whip them out discreetly on the plane.
6. Jet lag. Baby. Toddler. Kill me now.

And all of that isn’t even taking into account having to fight M. about our plans for the week. His usual M.O. is to arrive at his parents’ house and immediately sink into a sullen pit of silence. He distracts himself by going out – something I’ve been okay with doing up until now, since the toddler was bottle-fed and could be left alone with her grandparents without any problems. This time, baby boy is entirely breastfed and, while he’s not adverse to taking the occasional bottle (nor I in giving it to him), if we spend too much time apart my boobs are going to unilaterally decide that we must be done breastfeeding. So we’re simply going to have to spend more time together, which may seriously cut into M.’s sulking/hiding. I’ve warned him about this, but it remains to be seen if he really means it when he says “I know.”

And then there’s my inborn fear/dread/terror of in-law visits to contend with. It’s not M.’s parents’ fault at all – they’ve never been anything but pleasant to me, and they loved the toddler when we brought her out to see them. Good enough for me. But every trip out there is colored by a blowout my mother and grandmother had back in the day – and I mean WAY back in the day – that I’ve never really gotten out of my system. Seeing your mother cry, in public, sticks with you, and now I always go to my own in-laws half expecting some horrible argument to materialize seemingly out of nowhere, leaving me blubbering in its wake. Despite the fact that, to date, I have no reason to expect this from them.

I’ll miss my comfort zone. And we’re only going for a week. Very pathetic.