Spring Break in 2021 found our family doing what many families did in the age of Covid: making a beeline for Florida. Usually, I’m otherwise committed for work reasons, but because of the pandemic and the corresponding Easter holiday, I was free to join my family for a week at the beach.
Our condo rental was from Easter Sunday to the following Friday. My husband is a musician and had picked up a late gig the Saturday before Easter. We knew he’d arrive home around 2am Sunday morning, so we made a deal: if he’d get up to go to outdoor Sunrise Easter Service, we could leave straight for vacation from church, and I would drive the whole way. Hopefully he could sleep in the backseat, and we’d arrive at the beach by 4pm Central.
That meant we had to leave the house no later than 7:10 AM. We traded our normal domesticated family roles: I loaded the car and honked and yelled for everyone to hurry up or we’d be late for church. My rock star husband brought up the rear, casually climbing in the vehicle as I shifted into drive and gunned the engine. He is Risen, Indeed.
After Easter services, we were Westbound and down by 8:30. As per our usual family road trips, we had preselected a musical play list of the real classics to help educate the children. This one consisted of Outlaw Country and 90s Country, the songs from their dad and my wild oats sowing days. I sang most of the songs loudly and with confidence. Some of the words were even accurate.
I had read somewhere that a great way to teach your kids to always pay attention to the road—especially motorcyclists—for when they eventually start driving was to have contests to see who could spot the most motorcycles on road trips. I pledged $2 to the winner. The kids got excited about it, competing with each other while visions of hermit crabs danced in their heads.
We had our first biological incident of the trip about 20 miles from home in downtown Atlanta; our youngest vomited. Handheld video games and an overdose of Easter candy will do that to a boy. The one benefit of driving is that you can abstain from clean up duty if you simply keep on driving and abdicate responsibility to the other adult in the vehicle. Luckily, we know this is part of a Worrel family road-trip: we roll with plenty of Hefty bags and the kids generally have good reflexes. Maybe in the future, I should offer them $5 to catch their own puke.
Having driven all over the south for my job, I knew the basic route was thru downtown Atlanta, taking I-85 to Montgomery and getting off on AL-55. That I can do this without the aid of a GPS fascinates the children. I tell them it’s a gift passed on by their Grandpa, the Human GPS. Afterall, I used to ride shotgun, perched atop a green metal lunchbox looking at an atlas while my dad sang along with The Kingston Trio and Tennessee Ernie Ford.
When we crossed over the Alabama state line, the clock in our fancy schmancy automobile flipped back an hour. Our oldest— my shotgun rider—immediately caught on and asked why we were going west to Alabama if Florida is South of Georgia. I thought that this would be a wonderful opportunity to teach the children about time zones and geography, so I handed him an atlas—yes, I still carry one, thanks to my Dad. The children deemed Florida “the penis state” and declared that our destination was the “hairy region.” That would be the panhandle, Gulf Coast for the uninitiated.
As I mentally recovered from the horror of our geography lesson, contemplated my life choices, and wondered why our boys would be tempted by such gutter humor, the Worrel Family Playlist kicked in with a real golden oldie: Ray Wylie Hubbard’s “Up Against the Wall, Redneck Mother.” I briefly hung my head in resignation and took a deep breath. I know exactly how we got here: the grace of God and our own damn faults.
Acknowledging the fact, that yes: these are our boys, and yes: they come by all of this naturally, I flipped on my blinker to merge right and vacate the passing lane. I needed to let the twelve cars that stacked up behind me as my mind was wandering mosey on thru. At this very moment, my husband—who I thought had been sleeping—screamed “MOTORCYCLE!” from the back seat. I nearly had a heart attack thinking I was merging and killing someone at the exact same time, but the Rock Star was merely trying to prevent owing one of his own kids $2.
Everyone summarily lived through this incident, even the motorcyclist who was on the other side of the divided four lane highway. We’d made it to church. We survived a family road trip. We made it to the beach. And through all of this, my singular goal remains: to be a mother who has raised her sons so well (so well, so well).
