So the trip was not the rip-roaring success I'd hoped it would be.  I always love seeing my girls, but the agony of a sleepless child and husband rival the joy in comparing baby stories with people who used to covet your boyfriend.  Friday night went something like this:

8 p.m. Attempt to put little angel down. There is much milk and much rocking.  The little angel looks around two-year-old K's room, where we are sleeping.  She takes in the louvered doors, the scary shadows outside the window, the sounds from the street right outside that are so much louder than the ones in her room, protected as it is with a window unit for white noise and cool air.  She sees the pack-n-play, which is not NEARLY as comfy as her crib, and oh, so much closer to the scary hardwood floor.  She sees that Kitty and Tad are the only animals that have come with her.  She is not having any of it.

8:15 p.m.  I head back in.  I hear my other friends A. and M. show up. They ask where I am, and my friend K. tells them I am still with the little angel.  "Don't they ever just let her cry?" I hear A. ask.

8:45 p.m.  I decide to let them have it. I let the little angel howl at the top of her lungs for a good twenty minutes to squelch any more commentary before I go in, despite the fact I do feel for her, all alone in a strange room.  I haul her out and rock her until she falls asleep. It's travel time, and she's getting to the point where she knows the difference between things she can do when we travel and things she can do at home.

11:30 p.m.  After much pizza and wine, I decide to head to bed.  The boys have decided to build a fire in the outdoor fireplace, because that's what you do when you're drunk around midnight and know your child will be getting up in six or so hours.  I decide it's my beloved's own funeral and go to bed.  Unfortunately, here's where the hardwood floors and louvered doors come in - I can hear EVERYTHING.  I can't sleep. Plus, I have a head cold, and I'm on an Aero bed with only one pillow, unable to get any leverage to allow the phlegm to drain anywhere but into my compacted sinuses.  I hear the little angel shift. She's not used to people in her room.

12 a.m. - 2 a.m. The little angel shifts and pops straight up in her pack-n-play every twenty minutes or so.  I beg her to lie back down, but she will not unless I lay her down myself.  The Aero loses more air with each trip to the pack-n-play.  I hear cars going by, their riders cackling with alcohol-induced glee.  I am jealous. I would rather be anywhere but in this room. I think it can't possibly be worse.

3:30 a.m. Just as I go to sleep, my beloved walks in, smelling of burnt milk cartons.  The little angel immediately starts crying. A. starts cleaning the kitchen, slamming things around the counters and emptying cans into the garbage. I might kill him.

4 a.m. A. finally finishes his cleaning.  The little angel is finally sleeping. I begin counting backwards from 600 by threes as my beloved snores next to me. I put the pillow over my head and hope that maybe I will suffocate and end it all.

6:15 a.m.  The little angel is ready for the day.  I whimper softly, holding my throbbing head.

The next day didn't go much better. We took the darlings to the tailgate, hung out with friends and came back, thinking it was time for that nice noonish nap.  But oh, no.  At one point, both A. and K. fell asleep, leaving me to play with little K. and the little angel for an hour and a half while at the point of utter breakdown. When K. woke up (she hadn't realized little K. had escaped, since  that day was the first day she ever learned to open a door by herself), I began weeping with frustration and exhaustion.  Finally, at 3 p.m., the little angel finally passed out. I did, too.  We were supposed to go out with the girls that night, but K. and I only made it out for about two hours, and the boys didn't make it out at all. I passed out at 9:30 p.m., feeling sicker than sick.  So much for the big party weekend, eh?

On the five-hour return trip, my beloved and I discussed the sanity of all this car travel with a soon-to-be-eighteen-month-old.  We were supposed to go to Arkansas this weekend to see my BIL and SIL and nephew.  Then we were supposed to go back to Iowa City on Oct. 22 to see many family members, including MIL and FIL.  I think we're going to nix both trips.  This one hurt me so bad I couldn't even work yesterday. I spent most of the day in bed, trying to muster up the will to live.

It's ironic, though.  Your childless friends will think you're just boring if you never go anywhere because you have a kid, but there is a certain existential truth in realizing that if you visit, you're really in it alone.