One Too Many Road Trip Shots.

Oh, is this post lucky number thirteen? How thrilling.

Eleven hours into the drive. Feelin’ good. Not really…that’s just the song I suddenly want to listen to.

I think…

family road trips…

are like…

drinking.

Now, don’t be so quick to judge. I don’t drink, never have, and I honestly don’t think I ever sill. Excuse me, “will.” The road is getting to me. It’s a personal choice. The not drinking, I mean. Not the typo. Maybe I should go back to sleep.

What I mean is, you go into the road trip bar thinking, “This is exactly what I need. It will be such a great feeling to be cruisin’ down the highway with a destination in mind, with the promise of something new to see and learn on the way.” Once you get started, you actually believe yourself. For a while, road trips just feel right. Music, snacks, good ol’ family fun, wide open spaces, kum-bah-yah. (Is that even how you spell that? Does it matter…?

Next is the intoxication. After a few hours (road trip shots, eh?), you hit the road trip high, when you’ve forgotten how normal people sit in a seat, and you end up slouching with your torso bent in half with headphones stuck in your ears, possibly permantently. You have spontaneous giggle fits and you realize that your iPod playlist ran all the way through and you’ve been staring at the cornfields in total silence for the last half hour. Of course, you will soon pay for your road trip drunkenness.

Now, your stomach starts to reject the sweet and salty treats you’ve been eating just to occupy time. Your bladder threatens to overflow. (That doesn’t happen. It’s not a cup. You know what I mean.) A dull throbbing starts just behind your eyes, and you don’t know which is worse: the roar of the pavement rushing beneath you or the same songs you’ve been listening to all day, ringing in your head. All that’s left to do is sleep, but suddenly the car temperature is alternating between way too warm and way too cold, and there is no way to sit comfortably. With your belly churning, head aching, and your backside full of pins and needles, you try to ignore everything around you and enter a Zen state. (Is “Zen” usually capitalized? Spell-check keeps autocorrecting it…) Okay, maybe that’s just me. My family doesn’t seem to understand it.

When you finally arrive, you have the inevitable family road trip hangover. You know it will be quite some time before you pull another stunt like that again. Unfortunately, you also know that if you don’t do the road trip again, everyone will get cranky really quickly…seeing as no one brought enough clothes to stay forever.

Okay, so it’s not a perfect metaphor and/or simile. I know the difference between the two, by the way…I introduced it as a simile and explained it metaphorically. And I’ve been sitting for over eleven hours. I’m pretty sure there’s significantly less blood flowing through my head than usual, which means my thoughts are a wee bit scrambled. Well, that’s my excuse, anyway.
Seriously, you could wander into the cornfields around here and be lost for days. Have you ever been in one of those things? It’s like something straight out of a horror film. Or the sixth Harry Potter movie, when they’re chasing Bellatrix…never mind. Once I wandered into one at the farm and thought Old Yeller or Lassie or some other faithful canine would have to come to my rescue. Then again, I am a cat person. So I’d probably be gone forever.

I’d say that’s quite enough for now. I’ll go back to counting cows or something. See you when I have internet access…

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Mahtooshay S. Asleep.