A Timeline of Christmas Travel

We are back home, we arrived very late last night. Or very early this morning. Whatever, it was late and we were tired. I was thinking about how I could possibly relay the details of our trip home without boring you with a 35 paragraph post and I decided that a timelime was perfect. Short. Sweet. Quick. The polar opposite of our drive home from New Jersey.

11:20 a.m. Depart from my sister's house, from our early Christmas celebration, with happy thoughts of a ten hour drive filled with holiday cheer, Christmas carols and a few games of 20 Questions.

11:50 Joe falls asleep. Shush older boys. Call Laurie to let her know I forgot a whole lot of crap in the upstairs room.

12:03 Hang up with Laurie and cry on the inside because I miss her already.

12:30 Boys begin to voice their desire for food. They want McDonald's. Blech!

1:00 Boys still complaining that they are hungry. I tell them to look under the seats for stray Chick-Fil-A pieces. They do not laugh. We tell them we will stop when Joe wakes up.

1:03 Joe is awake. I suspect foulplay.

1:33 We stop at Friendly's, a step up from Mickey D's.

2:09 Shelly, a really nice waitress but slow as molasses in January, asks if we want ice cream for dessert. We do. Fifteen minutes later we are eating it.

2:25 Ask for check and hunt Shelley down to pay the bill so we can leave.

2:40 Back on 95 South. We are in Maryland. Kids want to watch Robinson Crusoe.

2:48 Go from a cruisin' 70 MPH to c-r-a-w-l-i-n-g.

3:01 Crawl into Virginia. Yay!! Virginia! Two and a half hours and we'll be in North Carolina.

3:08 I take a nap.

3:47 I wake up and see Kevin falling asleep. Never good. We pull over and switch. I am now in the driver's seat, in full control.

3:50 I floor it. We hit the highway and I just get up to cruising speed when -- BAM!! -- Brake lights.

4:30 Still in Virginia. Everyone in the tri-state area is with us.

4:55 Have gone 1 mile since 4:30. I am very upset with all of the people from the tri-state area.

5:18 Jeremy asks if we are out of Virginia yet. I tell him, No. He asks when we will be out of Virginia. I tell him on Wednesday. He does not get my joke.

5:35 We see an entrance onto the express lanes and take it. But not without some road rage from a New Yorker.

5:37 Woo-Hoo!! Speeding down 95.

6:01 BAM!! Brakelights again.

6:09 Kevin has to "go." He wants me to pull over so he can "go." Admittedly, I am cruel. I tell him, No, I don't want to lose my place in traffic hell.

6:10 I give in and pull off the road. Kevin, Jeremy and John "go" while I bang my head on the steering wheel.

6:13 Back on the road. Still barely moving. Begin to despise the great state of Virginia. Need some Tylenol, my head hurts from the banging.

6:35 See signs that read "Merge ahead. One mile." Finally, we are going to be able to move again.

6:49 See signs that read "Merge ahead. One-half mile." Begin to weep. Large tears. Very large tears.

6:58 MERGE!!

7:03 Accelerate to 35 MPH. The boys begin to rally in the backseats. "We're moving," they say. "We're moving fast!"

7:19 Kids are hungry again. We stop at WAWA for food and coffee and a bathroom, an inside bathroom.

7:34 Back on the road. And moving. Kevin is at the wheel again.

7:50 Joe is asleep again.

7:51 Wish that I was asleep.

8:09 Still in Virginia. Virginia is not for lovers.

8:40 Still in Virginia. Think to myself, "I will never do this again."

8:41 See signs for Richmond and the 295 bypass.

8:45 Silently appreciate the new contraband, AKA handheld video games that the boys received for Christmas from Kevin's brother.

9:15 My mother calls and asks if we are home yet. *Uproarious laughter* Nay, dear mother. We have been in Virgina for six hours. She's upset for us. We're upset for us, I say.

9:50 Hang up with mother and fill Kevin in on the conversation.

9:59 See signs that welcome us to North Carolina. We stop and have a moment of silence.

10:00 John wants to listen to Audio Adrenaline with the headphones. I get him all set up.

10:03 Kevin and I listen to the melodious sound of Jeremy snoring.

10:04 We chuckle.

10:30 John is snoring.

10:50 We break open the box of chocolate that was supposed to be a gift for our neighbors. Desperate times and all of that.

10:59 Did I mention that it has been pouring rain since we were at exit 5 on the NJ Turnpike?

11:02 We finally hit the exit for I-40. Not far now. Great, I have to "go."

11:03 "Kev," I say "You're doing 80." He says, "No. 85! Hang with me, baby, now is not the time for the fainthearted and fearful. We're going to turn a two hour trip into and hour and fifteen minutes."

12:23 By golly, he did it!

We arrived home to discover that the luggage, specifically my luggage was saturated. My Ugg slippers were dripping and I had to ring out my black linen pants. Oh, well.

The thing is, I would do it all over again just for the chance to spend Christmas with my family.

Look to the finish!