Looking out the window while flying from Boston to Dallas 2/3/10
Traveling
I do a lot of traveling in a year, usually for work, meaning something trans-related. This means some kind of conference, lobby day, meeting, or event. I have the airport check-in down to a science with the type of bag I carry, shoes I wear, and right sized toiletries. I still get a bit stressed out that I am going to miss my flight, but overall I get annoyed by the inconvenience of the lines.
I am amazed how much I fly these days. I had not been on airplane until I was almost 20 years old. Flying was just way to expensive for my family. If we wanted to go on vacation we got into the wood paneled station wagon and drove to another state like Pennsylvania or Maine. Then we would all cram into one hotel room, 2 adults and 4 kids, until each kid had melt down at least once and each parent threatened to either take us home early or leave one us on the side of the rode (neither event happened and I never feared that they would).
Our longest drive when I was a kid was to Florida and back to go to the ultimate childhood destination of Disney World. This was long before its expansion, when it was still just the "Magic Kingdom." I actually don't remember much except for being totally terrified on the Space Mountain ride and really wanting a pair of Mickey Mouse ears (which I never got). I do remember going to Sea World and petting Shamu the killer whale and the smell of oranges.
Even without a lot of money my parents tried to gives a the middle class style of life, at least by having us go on vacation every year. We may have gone to some of the middle class destinations like Disney World, but we still ate peanut butter and jelly sandwiches that my mom made instead of going out to lunch everyday or went the amusement park after 4p when the entrance fee was discounted. Vacations that didn't involve pitching a tent in the backyard meant planning and saving for at least a year in my family. To this day, I still can't believe we did some of these trips with the number of kids and the amount of money my parents made.
My mother called me the other night and asked if I wanted to go on an Alaskan cruise with her, its an all inclusive deal. Half-jokingly, I asked if we were going to drive up to meet the boat so we wouldn't have to pay for the airfare to get to Seattle, she is probably calculating the cost savings. I know if I do save up to do this, which I will have to do because vacations like this are still out my price range, and we do go she will have packed peanut butter and jelly so we can make sandwiches in our cabin for lunch.
