The sound of the Pack-N-Play rustles to life at 6 am. A nappy head with sleepy eyes pops up, followed by the cheerful sound from our two-year old moments later.
“Hi Mommy. Hi Daddy!”
Such a sweet sound to us first thing in the morning. Her genuine excitement and joyfulness fills the room. It might have sounded a bit more joyful to us, had we gone to bed earlier than 2 am the night before.
The writing was on the wall. It was going to be one of those high-octane coffee kinds of mornings. The kind that you drink with a fork and a knife. More accurately, it was time to pay up.
We had headed back to my old stomping grounds the night before for an evening out. Just the wife and I. There was a benefit planned back in my hometown for a high school friend of mine. It was something that I had been looking forward to for several weeks. Not only were we were going to see some of our old friends, but my wife was actually going to meet several people that I had literally grown up with. Some of which, going all the way back to kindergarten.
We had tried several times to do things like this in the past. A night out for the two of us. These attempts were often stymied by cataclysmic parent-related roadblocks. Sequences that usually started with us lining up one set of grandparents to watch our beloved offspring for the evening, followed by us packing the car for the eventual overnight road trip to their house. It may seem like a lot of time and effort for just a couple hours…but if the end result was a much-needed night out for my better half and I, the prep work involved doesn’t matter a whole lot.
Unfortunately, what typically transpires after this process is nothing short of epidemic plague and pestilence. Calamities of biblical proportions. I smite thee! Ka-blooey.
One instance had us driving to my in-laws for the day. The goal was to drop off the kids that afternoon and go out to dinner with some of our friends. About 45 minutes into the trip north, projectile vomiting ensued from the back seat. After coming to a screeching halt in front of a local police station and an animated, private conversation with my maker, a field-improvised sanitization plan was devised.
It’s really too bad that we didn’t happen upon a fire station instead. I probably would have been better off using one of their hoses for that particular decontamination activity. That, and maybe some of that sawdust stuff that they used for comparable biological disasters on school buses back-in-the-day. I have to be honest. Much like the effects that Ginger Ale has on my psychological feelings of queasiness, the smell of that sawdust will forever be engrained in the darkest recesses of my nausea psyche.
The U-turn trip home that afternoon was brutal. Although I adamantly denied it at the time, I really did intentionally aim for that skunk running across the road. Anything to provide a scented variety to my nose.
On yet another occasion, we drove north for a friend’s annual summer cookout. Old friends, good times, and extremely loud guitars. Same scenario. This time, we actually made it to my in-laws. Five minutes after walking in the door, our daughter throws up all over their dining room floor. After executing yet another Federal Superfund initiative, I immediately repacked the car and we headed home. Evening thwarted once again. Although the drive home that time was odor-free, I couldn’t say the same for the quarantined vicinities of my in-law’s house.
You get the idea. These outings with my wife are few and far between. They are also apparently subject to clearances and/or waivers by the EPA and the CDC. On those off-chances where the Gods of Bedlam do overlook the inevitable smiting of our plans and we actually make it out for an evening alone, we are prone to take full advantage of it. Unfortunately, taking advantage of these instances also tends to give us that “first week college freshman” mindset.
“Freedom!” Kilt and blue war paint optional.
It’s a scenario ripe for exploitation and abuse. Circumstances that often lead to humanly-toxic doses of Pepto-Bismol and caffeine the next morning.
The benefit that Saturday night turned out to be a great success. All kinds of people turned out from my days in high school. It was great seeing some of those people that I had literally grown up with too. Amazing that after all of these years, that handful of us really hadn’t changed that much. Good, bad, or still pending sentencing.
After the benefit had wrapped up for the evening, the wife and I decided to take advantage of the remainder of our evening by having a nice dinner and a couple of drinks. Upon sitting down for our meal, it was discovered that several of our friends were also visiting the same establishment. Our table was consequently abandoned and a respectable corner of the bar was taken hostage for the evening.
I monitored the time pretty frequently over the next couple of hours. 10:00, 11:00, midnight. We were so busy catching up on good times, that the time didn’t seem relevant. It had never had previously…at least, before kids. I kept telling myself that it wasn’t getting “late” because “late” used to equate to “sunrise” a decade or so ago. I was convinced and determined that my 40 year old carcass could still hang. At least for another ten or fifteen minutes. Maybe.
Deep down though, I knew we’d be required to pay up come sunrise. And that this reality was going to hurt.
Now close to 1 am, my wife suddenly realizes what time it is. Pumpkin status…officially outed. The fact remained that we still had to drive 45 minutes back to my in-laws house and get up with the kids at o’dark:30 tomorrow morning.
Correction. THIS morning. Duly noted. It was time to go.
Although I had the temporary, misguided delusion of being a college freshman for a couple of hours, the reality is that we successfully made it out for the evening and had fun. We got to spend time together, see old friends, and have grown-up conversations. Conversations that didn’t end with the catch-all quip “because I said so”. Of course, while temporarily entrenched in these adolescent delusions, one often doesn’t take into consideration the reality of following day’s responsibilities.
Because reality doesn’t sleep in.
