A roadtrip snapshot

All the movies, please.

We zipped up the cooler filled with salami, cheese, cucumbers, Clayton’s homemade waffles and an ice pack that would last us the 9 hours across Midwest highways to Ohio.

I always over packed for road trips: a bin of 15 books, a download playlist of podcasts, magnets and a baking sheet, markers, crayons, magic water paints, blankets, the travel potty, Fisher-Price people and tiny blankets that Kate would use to cover her “tiny friends.”

I’d write out a potential plan for each hour in my notebook:

• Hour 1: Entertain themselves? Podcast?

• Hour 2: Snack

• Hour 3: Encourage rest/nap

• Hour 4: Snack

• Hour 5: Listen to a the new Playaway?

My over-planned agenda stretched across the miles.

But now I was 26 weeks pregnant, delicate in my movements. I couldn’t gracefully climb from the front seat to the middle row every seven miles to retrieve a marker lid. I was less patient to answer questions or hold books at just the right angle so both girls could see every picture.

Before the trip, I’d ordered headphones for Kate, her first pair. I started the ride beside her in the captain’s chair, ready to be on-demand entertainment for the hours ahead. When she grew restless in her carseat, I synced the yellow and teal headphones to my phone and queued up, “Bee Bee Bumblebee” on loop, her request. She snuggled under her blanket and drifted off.

I estimated I’d have about two hours or 130 miles until she woke up.

Caroline had been quietly writing in her notebook for a long time, but I knew her patience would wane soon. I glanced at the bin of activities by my feet. What next for Caroline? Sticker book? Matching game? Another Unicorn Diaries chapter?

I noticed the corner of my own book peaking out of the backseat pocket.

I reached forward into the center console, a space reserved for real emergencies.

I passed the van’s headphones back to Caroline, threw on Encanto and opened my book.

---