California Dreamin'

If any of you have tried to ride on a plane with an infant, I apologize for any dirty looks I may have ever given you. I take them back ten-fold. For those of you who are thinking about it ... keep thinking about it. I pretty much had the best case scenario for this thing and it was still a chore.

However, the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow; visiting my grandparents in California was worth all the hassle. On the way there, I sat next to a grandmother of eight who helped me change Megan's diaper right there in the seat. Then, from Dallas to San Francisco my mom traveled with us and basically held her the entire time, thus helping me push back my eventual rotator cuff surgery from carting that little girl around from 2014 to 2015.

This trip, theoretically, was about Megan visiting her great grandparents and other family members, but in truth, part of this trip was for me. It has been about six or seven years since I was last in California and I'm now at that age where I can reminisce about how things have changed and have the maturity of perspective. On the flight back I told my mom that the biggest thing for me was recognizing how much smaller everything seemed in contrast to my summer trips as a child to their house. The bedroom I stayed in used to be ginormous in my mind, the living room a massive playpen, the fence leading to the park behind their house a castle wall. But in reality the bedroom and living room were average-sized and the fence required only a four-rung ladder to hop across it.

Obviously Megan is too little to remember any of the trip; but I hope in future trips I can share more of the stories of the place I loved to visit. I want to show her the backyard where the above-ground pool used to be, the side of the house where my uncle used to raise and breed rabbits, the garage where I helped another uncle tinker with his restoration of an Opel, or picking figs off the backyard fruit trees.

I'm not sure how trips to your grandparents were for you, but for me being in California as a kid was a departure from 'normal life.' This was a foreign world of nice, temperate weather that I never understood all the way back in Louisiana. Going to the boardwalk in Santa Cruz, eating hot dogs at WeinerSchnitzel, riding roller coasters at Great America, driving four-wheelers in the sand dunes were just a few of the thrilling adventures I got to do as a kid. But I also liked playing cards with my grandma at the kitchen table. My first taste of Ramen noodle soup came there, and breakfasts of toast sprinkled with sugar, butter, and honey was like jet fuel for a young body.

Early on Saturday, while I was 'helping', okay, watching my Uncle Brent build a ramp for the entrance to their house, my mom took Megan on a walk to the park and told me she had put Megan in the baby swings and she loved it. Well, this is a moment that couldn't be missed. So we went back to that park a few hours later so I could witness this huge moment. While there mom told me stories about playing in that exact playground as a kid, followed by my laughing and admitting that this was exactly where I came to hang out while I was visiting. And now ... my daughter was swinging in that same playground, nearly 2,500 miles away from where we live. It may sound corny, but it was a surreal moment for me because those trips to California as a kid seem like centuries ago now and I never thought I would remember those feelings again. So, there's no telling what it was like for my mom, but for me it was a great experience.

So while the trip only lasted for four days, it felt like a lifetime. I'm ecstatic that Megan got to 'meet' most of the California contingent of our family. I'm saddened that my Aunt Pauline and Uncle John were on vacation and we missed them, but that just provides the impetus for another return trip in the future.

When she doesn't need to be held.