Flight of fancy

I can't remember the last time I flew anywhere with my kids. It may have been a year and a half ago, when my husband and I were visiting law schools and searching for apartments. We took the baby with us, and as I recall, she mostly slept. In a week, I'll be travelling with all three of my angels, on my own. As excited as I am to be going home and seeing my family, I have to say, I'm dreading the flight itself.

When I was growing up, airline trips were probably the most exciting events I could imagine. They meant adventure, seeing exotic and exciting places, eating out a lot, visiting friends and family, getting away. In high school, my best friend and I would drive to the outskirts of the airport watching the planes taking off and landing; and we'd dream of being "anywhere but here". After high school, I took my first transatlantic flights to Israel and Europe. I can still recall the anticipation so real, so sweet, I could taste it as surely as a dark chocolate morsel melting on my tongue.

In graduate school, the novelty was already wearing thin. Most of my flights were to and from fencing competitions. I was anxious to be there, nervous, and often tired. I dreaded delays, or getting stranded in a strange airport. Mostly, I was a poor college kid digging myself deeper and deeper into debt for the glory of competing in an obscure, non-revenue generating sport. Airports were quickly associating themselves with stress.

Now, a mother of three, it's not so much stress as flat-out panic I'm anticipating. I don't fly often enough to be familiar with the security procedures, and I'm trying to figure, logistically, how I'm going to manage with three excited, anxious, curious little ones. The news has been full of horror stories of cancelled flights, or even worse, planes stuck out on the tarmac for eight to ten hours, running out of food, air conditioners off, restrooms clogged. Even a delay of a couple of hours could be unbearable. I'm seriously considering putting the president of the airline's office number in my cell phone speed dial. Is that too extreme?

I'm going home to be with my family, and that's motivation enough to get me on that airplane with my three kids. My parents, my abuela, my sisters, their kids, the new niece I have yet to meet, and my cousins and their babies whom I have also yet to meet are all going to be together for the first time in years.

It's so hard for me to fathom how far we've drifted apart. I was so fortunate, as a young girl, to grow up spitting distance from my grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins. The "far away" cousins lived a mere three hour drive, in Houston, but we still saw them at least once a month. Today we're scattered to the four corners of the country, and my cousins have babies I have yet to meet. I mourn the dissipation of my tight-knit family, as much for my children's sake as mine. I really love my family, as corny as it sounds. I really miss being with them around a big dining room table for holiday meals, I miss celebrating the happy occasions, and sharing the pain of the sad. I've been blessed with the funniest, sweetest, smartest, and coolest sets of siblings and cousins a woman could ask for. I should have prayed harder for us to stay nearby.

So I'll stifle the scary thoughts, pack up my camera, drug my children (just kidding!) and embrace the airways, as long as they're headed home to my family.