Road Trip Blues

Ever wonder how to take a road trip, with kids, I mean little kids, I mean kids that are 1 and 2 years old that is the equivalent of fun? I don't think it is possible. I do not have a portable DVD player, nor do I feel they would succumb to bribery, they do not understand the concept of money. I love them very much so much that it hurts. In fact a lot of my recovery is based on the fact that the changes I am making in my life today make me a better mother. I don't yell and cuss them because they are being themselves. I am very understanding, why just the other day my sponsor was over here and said I have the patience of a saint. Most people would run screaming out the door if they had the willful 2 year old I deal with on a daily basis. I am learning to embrace them so well today and that makes me proud as a mother. So please do not think that I am ungrateful or do not appreciate my babies, I am just trying to process a road trip and how I can do better next time, yes there will be a next time. We scheduled a trip to Topeka which is about 3 hours away from Wichita, if you are an adult with no children, and about 5 hours with frequent stops to try to stop the screaming. No I was not the one screaming, in my head maybe, but imagine a beautiful 2 and a half year old baby girl with beautiful golden locks of hair and did I mention the curls, she has a head full of little tornadoes and she is as wild as her hair! Next imagine a beautiful brown eyed 1 and a half year old with thin brown hair and a calm little crooked smile and a beautiful gaze staring up at you. So sweet the little angels are when they are calm. Now do you remember the attack on Pearl Harbor? Do you remember the way Mount St. Helen's blew her top? Put those two events together in the back of a Dodge pick up truck and you can sort of get the gist of our trip yesterday. The Serenity Prayer only works for so long, then I recall at some point looking over at the love of my life and telling him how "this looked good on paper, now what?!" I do not remember praying for patience so I do not know why mine was tested so much yesterday but what I do know is that we managed to make it home with all the kids still alive and no road rage, however we missed our function as they would not cooperate to sit at it and it almost felt like we wasted 2 tanks of gas. I mean it was an awful long way to drive just for a hamburger. I wish he would have listened to me and left me and the kids at home yesterday so at least one of us could have stayed for the speaker meeting. Next time I will definitely put my foot down and say no we will stay here and you go enjoy yourself dear. We made it to Topeka around 12:30 in the afternoon and dropped off some Halloween t-shirts to the area activities chair there then went to the Baldwin city shindig, we didn't get there until 3:pm and I had no idea this was an outside event. Mind you this is the middle of October in Kansas and the wind was gusting at 40 miles per hour. To those of you with out children this is where when the wind comes and blows real hard you grab the kids before they get blown into the lake!! We managed to be able to eat a couple of burgers but the girls, who were just happy to be out of the restraints of the car seats suddenly had red faces with lots of snot running down them, of course we had no mittens or heavy coats as I stated before we got there I had no idea we were going to be outside, not only outside but outside with no facilities. My 14 year old wouldn't come out of the truck because she had to pee. I told her we would have to find a tree to squat somewhere and she said she wasn't going to do it. After promising to pee with her I finally got her out and led her into the forest. It was there that I learned 2 things, one: my daughter doesn't know how to squat, and two: she told me "I hate you guys." Of course the second part she said through laughter as I was holding her hand so she could balance while peeing enough to fill the darn lake!! The members were wonderful of course and very gracious and I really wanted to stay and hear my friend share his story but the kids were just too cold to sit out in the weather, not that they were sitting. Wes was sitting and enjoying the meeting while I was running around corralling the children, so of course I wasn't cold. I know that we really just need to wait until they are a little bit older but we really miss a lot of the fellowship when we don't go to events. So I will call my sponsor now, do some step work and get ready for tonight's meeting. My morning meditation is as follows: "Today I will trust that the events in my life are not random. My experiences are not a mistake. The universe, my Higher Power and life are not picking on me. I am going through what I need to go through to learn something valuable, something that will prepare me for the joy and love I am seeking." Melody Beattie, The Language of Letting Go-pg. 313