As you parents know, a small child can go for weeks without going to the bathroom at home, but once you hit the road, it becomes pretty much a full-time occupation. During my son Robert’s early years, he and I visited just about every men’s room on the East Coast. And if it was a really disgusting men’s room, a men’s room that contained the skeletons of Board of Health workers who died trying to inspect it, Robert would inevitably announce that he had to do Number Two.
So he’d go into a stall and close the door, and his little legs would disappear, and he’d remain there for as long as two days. God alone knows what he was doing in there. Meanwhile, of course, I’d stand guard outside the stall, because you can’t leave a three-year-old alone. Inevitably strangers would come in, and there I’d be, apparently just hanging out alone in a men’s room, and they’d look at me suspiciously. So in an effort to reassure these strangers that I was a Father on Duty, as opposed to some kind of lurking men’s-room pervert, I’d try to strike up a conversation with Robert through the stall door:
ME: So, Robert, my three-year-old son who is inside this stall that I’m guarding as a responsible parent! How’s it going in there?
STALL DOOR: (silence)
ME: Ha ha! Speak up, Robert!
STALL DOOR: (silence)
And the strangers would turn and stride quickly out the door, because nobody wants to be in a public rest room with a person who’s talking to a toilet stall.
Of course, if there’s anything more exciting than traveling with a child, it’s traveling with several children. We ourselves have only one child, because after Beth experienced the Joy and Wonder of natural childbirth, she decided not to experience it again until modern science invents a method whereby the man has the contractions. But we have taken Robert’s friends with us on numerous trips, and we have noted a phenomenon familiar to all parents, namely that you would have less conflict if you put the entire North and South Korean armed forces in your backseat than you get with just two children.
Children sitting in backseats are incapable of normal human conversation. Their conversational responses are all intended to raise the level of backseat hostility to the point where one party has no viable option but to spit Yoo– hoo into the other party’s hair.
Examples
STATEMENT OF CHILD: Hey! I saw a horse!
RESPONSE OF NORMAL HUMAN: Where?
RESPONSE OF OTHER CHILD IN BACKSEAT: So what? (Or: “You did not.”)
STATEMENT OF CHILD: I like this song.
RESPONSE OF NORMAL HUMAN: That’s nice.
RESPONSE OF OTHER CHILD IN BACKSEAT: So what? (Or: “You do not.”) (Or: “This song sucks.”)
STATEMENT OF CHILD: In a right triangle, the square of the hypotenuse is equal to the sum of the squares of the other two sides.
RESPONSE OF NORMAL HUMAN: That is correct.
RESPONSE OF OTHER CHILD IN BACKSEAT: You suck.
One way to try to reduce the hostility level is to keep the children amused with Traditional Fun Car Games, such as watching for other cars’ license plates and seeing who can find the one from the most distant state. This exciting activity is sure to captivate the children and provide hours of enjoyment (“I see one from Iowa!” “No you don’t!” “So what?” “You suck!”).
But for real family travel fun, there’s no substitute for actually reaching some kind of destination. And the Number One family travel destination of all, as measured in total miles of people waiting in line, is of course:
The Walt “You Will Have Fun” Disney World Themed Shopping Complex And Resort Compound
I’m an expert on visiting Disney World, because we live only four hours away, and according to my records we spend about three-fifths of our after-tax income there. Not that I’m complaining. You can’t have a bad time at Disney World. It’s not allowed. They have hidden electronic surveillance cameras everywhere, and if they catch you failing to laugh with childlike wonder, they lock you inside a costume representing a beloved Disney character such as Goofy and make you walk around in the Florida heat getting grabbed and leaped on by violently excited children until you have learned your lesson. Yes, Disney World is a “dream vacation,” and here are some tips to help make it “come true” for you!
When to Go: The best time to go, if you want to avoid huge crowds, is 1962. How to Get There: It’s possible to fly, but if you want the total Disney World experience, you should drive there with a minimum of four hostile children via the longest possible route. If you live in Georgia, for example, you should plan a route that includes Oklahoma.
Once you get to Florida, you can’t miss Disney World, because the Disney corporation owns the entire center of the state. Just get on any major highway, and eventually it will dead-end in a Disney parking area large enough to have its own climate, populated by large nomadic families who have been trying to find their cars since the Carter administration. Be sure to note carefully where you leave your car, because later on you may want to sell it so you can pay for your admission tickets.
But never mind the price; the point is that now you’re finally there, in the ultimate vacation fantasy paradise, ready to have fun! Well, okay, you’re not exactly there yet. First you have to wait for the parking-lot tram, driven by cheerful uniformed Disney employees, to come around and pick you up and give you a helpful lecture about basic tram-safety rules such as never fall out of the tram without coming to a full and complete stop. But now the tram ride is over and it’s time for fun! Right? Don’t be an idiot. It’s time to wait in line to buy admission tickets. Most experts recommend that you go with the 47-day pass, which will give you a chance, if you never eat or sleep, to visit all of the Disney themed attractions, including The City of the Future, The Land of Yesterday, The Dull Suburban Residential Community of Sometime Next Month, Wet Adventure, Farms on Mars, The World of Furniture, Sponge Encounter, the Nuclear Flute Orchestra, Appliance Island, and the Great Underwater Robot Hairdresser Adventure, to name just a few.
Okay, you’ve taken out a second mortgage and purchased your tickets! Now, finally, it’s time to ... wait in line again! This time, it’s for the monorail, a modern, futuristic transportation system that whisks you to the Magic Kingdom at nearly half the speed of a lawn tractor. Along the way cheerful uniformed Disney World employees will offer you some helpful monorail-safety tips such as never set fire to the monorail without first removing your personal belongings.
And now, at last, you’re at the entrance to the Magic Kingdom itself! No more waiting in line for transportation! It’s time to wait in line to get in. Wow! Look at all the other people waiting to get in! There are tour groups here with names like “Entire Population of Indiana.” There sure must be some great attractions inside these gates!
And now you’ve inched your way to the front of the line, and the cheerful uniformed Disney employee is stamping your hand with a special invisible chemical that penetrates your nervous system and causes you to temporarily acquire the personality of a cow. “Moo!” you shout as you surge forward with the rest of the herd.
And now, unbelievably, you’re actually inside the Magic Kingdom! At last! Mecca! You crane your head to see over the crowd around you, and with innocent childlike wonder you behold: a much larger crowd. Ha ha! You are having some kind of fun now!
And now you are pushing your way forward, thrusting other vacationers aside, knocking over their strollers if necessary, because little Jason wants to ride on Space Mountain. Little Jason has been talking about Space Mountain ever since Oklahoma, and by God you’re going to take him on it, no matter how long the ... My God! Can this be the line for Space Mountain? This line is so long that there are Cro-Magnon families at the front! Perhaps if you explain to little Jason that he could be a deceased old man by the time he gets on the actual ride, he’ll agree to skip it and ... NO! Don’t scream, little Jason! We’ll just purchase some official Mickey Mouse sleeping bags, and we’ll stay in line as long as it takes! The hell with third grade! We’ll just stand here and chew our cuds! Mooooo!