ODD mom moments

Have you ever had something you really wanted to do, and you get the chance to do it, but you know it is just not very good timing? Do you do it anyway?

Well, I did. 

I have always wanted to go to Ireland and the United Kingdom with my family. A bonus from Ike’s work, super cheap plane tickets, and homeschooled children created this one-time chance. Timing? Well, this may seem like perfect timing. 

Or maybe not.

You see, to make it worth the trip for all of us, I knew we needed two or three weeks. Leaving for that long was hard. Ike and I both had a lot of responsibilities at home. Although I disliked planning around sports, we coached three of our kids’ soccer teams at the time, so the months of April, May, September, and October were pretty much out. Those super cheap plane ticket prices did not extend to the summer months. So we settled on March. March can be kind of warm, right?

It wasn’t. 

Another reason this trip was maybe not at the best time was that my children were young and not very merry travelers. This is not to say we didn’t do any traveling with them. We traveled a bit, but maybe a few years would have made things easier. I didn’t want to wait a few years. Besides, Aurora was the most difficult traveler, and a few years probably was not going to change that.

When Aurora was ten, we made the trip across the pond to the United Kingdom and Ireland. We were joined by my mother-in-law which was a huge blessing. I tried to plan our itinerary in such a way that we had a variety of activities. I knew my kids would not appreciate seeing castles every day, so we hiked to a waterfall, rode in a carriage, fed some hawks, inspected ruins, went to museums, watched Irish dancing, visited the countryside, and…saw some castles.

About twelve days into our trip, we had an unplanned day. I purposefully left a couple of days of our trip empty in case we were worn out and needed a respite. That morning we decided it would be neat on our unplanned day to revisit a castle that we had seen in passing, but had not been able to enter at the time. 

We started loading everyone into the tiny rental van (that van could be its own whole story…maybe another time). A scuffle quickly ensued amongst the children. Aurora, naturally, did not want to sit in the back seat despite the fact that it was her turn. We had to make a decision. Do we play it fair and make her sit in the back? If so she would scream at everyone, make life miserable, and hold us all up at our destination. Or do we abandon justness for peace? We chose to try and make her sit in the back.

“I don’t fit back there,” she shouted.

“It’s your turn,” I answered.

“Well, someone smaller should have to sit back there.”

“It’s your turn.”

“Well…” she stammered. I could almost see her brain searching for a retort. “Well, I don’t even want to go to another dumb castle.”

“We are all going together.”

“I will stay here.”

“That’s not allowed.”

“Well, I will stay here if I have to sit in the back.”

“We are all going together,” I repeated. 

I repeat myself a lot.

She glared at me, “I will go in the car, but I’m not going in the castle.” She grumpily climbed into the back seat, whacking her brother’s head on the way.

“I guess we can decide that when we get there,” I muttered.

With everyone in the car, I said cheerfully, “Let’s listen to our book.” We had brought a couple of audiobooks on an iPod just for the many hours we had in the car.

“No!” screeched Aurora from the back seat. “I don’t want to listen to anything.”

“Ok, we will travel in silence just for your pleasure,” I said smiling, rather sarcastically. Not my best moment.

We arrived at Ross Castle in what was perhaps not the best of spirits. 

“I’m not going in,” Aurora declared again.

I stared at her. Traveling was so hard for her. She was forced to be stuck in the same space (a van) for long periods of time. She did not have any of her comforts like her room, her dog, or our backyard. She had nowhere to go to simmer down. I somewhat understood the difficulties she was facing. That did not make her behavior acceptable…just understandable. I sighed and said, “I will stay in the car with you.”

Everyone else climbed out and headed to the castle. I slid into the seat next to Aurora and pulled out my phone. I said, “Let’s look at what we are doing tomorrow.”

“Is it another castle?” challenged Aurora. 

I stifled a laugh. “No. We are going horse-back riding.” 

I showed her the pictures of the horses that we would be riding as they were shown on the company’s website. She seemed to soften a little. 

“What time are we going?” she asked.

“I’ll look,” I said, already searching for my paper with the itinerary.

I stared at the paper. “Oh no!” I breathed.

“What?” she said, sounding alarmed.

“Horse-back riding is supposed to be today. In ten minutes. And it’s an hour and a half away from here.” Somehow I had switched the plans for that day and the next in my head.

Aurora quickly glanced at me with a panicky look on her face.

“I’ll call them,” I said, trying to sound calm.

I called and explained the situation. I told the company that we couldn’t get there for another two hours, but that we still wanted to make it work somehow. I asked if we could go the next day instead. I told them we were from out of the country and we couldn’t just reschedule. The lady I spoke with on the phone has to be one of the nicest people I have met. She said we could not go the next day, but that if we could get there as soon as possible that same day, it would still work. I thanked her, hung up, and called Ike.

I explained what had happened.

“Um…we’re in the middle of a tour. We kind of have to finish here.”

“Fine, just don’t linger, please.”

I was anxious. Everything could still work out. I couldn’t just sit still. Aurora and I got out of the van. It had been raining for days. In fact, it had rained every single day of our trip so far. (See what I mean about it not being the best timing? Ireland in March is very wet). Because of the incessant rain, some of the streets, sidewalks, and park areas were completely flooded over. We wandered and explored the rain-soaked area. It was so beautiful. 

By the time the rest of our group rejoined us, Aurora was completely calm and actually excited to drive an hour and a half to ride horses. Did she get in the back seat happily? Well, no. She still didn’t think that was a good idea. Let’s just say that while she did not get in the back seat happily, she did get in less grumpily.

Riding horses on the beach in Ireland is my favorite memory of our trip. This whole situation raises a question, though. How responsible is Aurora for her behavior? She says to me quite often, “I can’t help it.” Or, “Can you help how you feel?” On one hand, I think she has a point. It is harder for her to control herself than it is for others. Does that make it acceptable for her to scream at everyone? Absolutely not. So how responsible is she for how she acts? I really don’t know. I think this is a bigger question than I can possibly answer or try to address in a couple paragraphs. Society has never been able to give a very good answer to this question either. We hear all the time about how a person just couldn’t help acting a certain way. 

We hear things like: “This is just who I am.”

“Don’t try to change me.”

“I was born this way.”

And just like Aurora would say, “I can’t help it.”

When we justify our own or others’ actions by stating, “I can’t help it,” or “they can’t help it,” then we enable a culture that is stagnant. It is unchanging. It does not promote growth. I cannot accept that. My daughter cannot go through life expecting the world to tolerate her out of control screaming. Now, I can’t solve society’s issues. I don’t have a solution. What I can do is reiterate the importance of being kind. I can try to be a good example. And I can try to help Aurora by creating situations where she can be successful in controlling herself. Sometimes situations are inherently more tricky, but I can try to avoid sticking her into a tiny van with her siblings in a foreign country for three weeks and dragging her to see just one more castle. Yes, it is harder for her, but she can learn a little at a time. We can always keep trying.