Shut the Front Door

The other day, I stumbled upon this website – My Little Nomads, about Travel. With. Kids. A centerpiece of the site is an article called "Why you should do it, and do it now." Author David Robert Hogg claims that in 3 minutes he can convince you that you should not waste another moment before booking those tickets to explore the world on a journey of discovery with your precious little ones. You have a window of opportunity that is closing every minute. Soon enough, the window will close and your opportunity will be lost and your kids will be off discovering without you.

I say, "Hurry up, shut the window. And while you're at it, shut the front door. And lock it. But whatever you do – stay home!" I have never before been so inclined to comment on a web page with a rebuttal. Let me explain why.

Before I had kids, travel was my greatest joy in life. On the plane home from a trip, I would be thinking about where I wanted to go next. When we were saving money to adopt Rose Red, I stayed home for two years and became depressed. Finally, I couldn't take it anymore, took a chunk of adoption money and spent 10 days in Costa Rica. All better.

Before I had kids, I had an idea about the kind of family I wanted to have. I dreamed of exploring the world together, sharing my love of discovering new places and trying new foods with my kids. I imagined watching them play on tropical beaches with local children with no spoken language in common; I imagined playgrounds on foreign continents and recklessly indulging in street food treats. I imagined disposable cameras filled with pictures of things only a kid would notice.

The first time I traveled with Rose Red was the second day we knew her. She was traumatized and scared and wanted her foster mom. She had never been on an airplane before, or in a seat belt, and when the stewardess buckled her in, she knew she wasn't going on vacation. She screamed hysterically for most of the three hour flight to Guangzhou. But that trip in China wasn't like regular travel. No one was expected to have any fun that time.

 I've only taken two trips with my girls since Snow White was born, but we've been to two emergency rooms while traveling.  I searched all over My Little Nomads, and found that Hogg's family had made two trips to the emergency room in all their many travels.
Hogg recommends that families traveling with infants request the bassinet when flying internationally. He said that his younger son slept 8 hours in the bassinet on the way to Asia. We got the bassinet when we took our trip to Japan. We had to split up the family to do it, because the bassinet seats are clustered together and it was a full flight. So although Rose and my husband were on the plane, I flew to Japan alone with Snow White, who refused to go anywhere near the bassinet. She screamed in my arms for the first 7 hours (no Benadryl didn't work) and finally fell asleep nursing. The bassinet blocked the armrest-mounted movie screen, so I spent the last three hours of the flight nursing, staring at the bulkhead, afraid to go asleep because I'd drop the baby.
During our two trips we've had lost luggage and flights delayed over 2 hours on the tarmac. We've had jetlagged kids who dragged us out to breakfast so early that 24hours Denny's was still serving dinner but at least that way we weren't waking up everyone in the hostel. We've fallen asleep standing on subways carrying sleeping children in our arms while baby backpacks hung empty on our shoulders. We've paid hundreds of dollars to mail suitcases home rather than carry them on one more train. We've run out of diapers and bibs and lost sippies and snacks everywhere we've gone. We've had heat rash, diaper rash, face plants, food reactions, and reactions to cigarette smoke in restaurants. What we have not had is fun. Our vacations are straight out of Band of Brothers.

I almost posted this as a rebuttal to Hogg and his perfect little nomads. But then I thought, maybe that isn't fair. For whatever reason, ours seems to be a hard way kind of family. It's true at home, so it shouldn't be a surprise that it's true abroad. But Hogg's premise isn't that everyone should make a lifestyle of travel. It's that everyone should try it. You never know until you try, and the rewards, if it works out, are as priceless as Hogg says they are.  That's why Hogg wants everyone to try it. He wants everyone to take a trip.

Before I had kids, I agreed completely with Hogg's philosophy. And even though it hasn't really worked out for me personally, I guess that ultimately I still agree with him.