Tales of the Trip, part 2: No Rest for the Weary

As I’d mentioned in my last tale, we rolled into Joseph, Oregon at the end of the day.

We were worn out. Aside from the mental assault wrought by Dora and her buddies, the strain of keeping the van moving while keeping everyone inside relatively happy, and the stiffness brought about by remaining in pretty much one position for the entire time had taken its toll.

Now, I don’t ask for much. I really don’t think I do. I was only hoping to relax when I got there. After all that driving, I was hoping to just zone out for a while.

But as long as Michael’s on the job, there is no zoning to be had. Constant vigil is his implicit theme.

And as bed time rolled around, it was clear that he would demand vigilance down to his very last waking moment. I’m no stranger to Michael’s aversion to allowing me to have a peaceful night’s sleep, and thus while brushing my teeth for the night, I was already braced for a struggle. There would be no smooth sailing tonight, but mizzenmast stowed and rigging secured for a Nor’easter.

The kids had assumed Michael would be bunking with them in the big bonus room. But his mom and I knew that if we tried that, nobody would get any sleep. We’d already made up our minds that the easiest way to weather this storm would be to defuse it from the get-go and just have Michael snuggle with his mom all night.

Only, Michael didn’t want to snuggle with mommy. He wanted to be with his sisters and cousins. He wanted to be where the action is. Where the fun is. Where all the big kids are staying, obviously not sleeping but whooping it up in an all-night toy, movie, candy and flapping-around fest. Michael had it all figured out.

And to make it all the more pleasant, his sisters didn’t want him there. They (particularly the older two) are hyper-sensitive to all forms of external stimuli. Movement of any kind, excessive vibrations of air molecules, the errant photon, gamma brain waves within a forty foot radius; these are all unacceptable manifestations of commotion when they’ve made up their mind to sleep.

This is directly at odds with Michael’s need to flop around before he goes to sleep. It’s just what he does, and they’re all aware of this. Watching TV downstairs at home when Michael’s just been put to bed is usually punctuated with reports from upstairs, where it sounds like Michael is remodeling. They should know he doesn’t just drop off to sleep.

So when we brought Michael into their room, we were met with a collective groan. At least his Cousin A was amenable. He’s a good guy, and always willing to step up to the plate and do what’s right. We bade them goodnight and hoped all would be well.

It wasn’t even five minutes when sister B escorted him back into our room.

“He won’t stay in his bed. He keeps getting up and running around,” she said.

“Okay, Michael. You just stay here with us. Let’s read a book,” I said.

“I don’t wanna stay here! I wanna be with the big kids!” he whined.

He flopped around in our bed while I attempted to read a couple of books, chatting with his mom, asking for water, crawling around and using our legs as a makeshift McDonald’s playland.

Lights out time came, and this energized him all the more. He rolled over on this side. He rolled over on that side. He climbed on his mom. He climbed on me.

Eventually, we grew weary of this, and offered him one more chance with the big kids.

I escorted him back to the room, where the collective groan was accentuated with a collective eye-roll.

“I wanna sleep with A,” Michael said. We asked cousin A if that was okay, he said yes.

“Okay, Michael. But you have to stay here. Do you understand?”

“Yes!”

“Good night, everyone,” I said, and headed back to our room.

And all was quiet, for a long time.

I was just starting to drift off, when I heard a cry: “No! No! No! No! Waaaaaaaah!” It grew louder and louder, approaching our door.

(Insistent pounding on the door)

“What?”

Sister B reports: “He keeps getting out of bed! He ran to mine, then he kept poking me. Then he jumped out of my bed and ran to Ss, and started pulling her hair. He won’t stay in bed.”

I got up and opened the door.

“All right, Michael. You’ve used up your last chance. You are staying here,” I said.

“No! I don’t wanna!”

“Too bad. You should have been good.”

“I’ll be good!”

“It’s too late for that.”

“I don’t wanna it be too late!”

“Come on, climb in bed.”

He did, still sniveling.

“Good night, Michael. Go to sleep.”

But sleep, he did not.

He climbed on his mom. He climbed on me. He wanted to slip in between his mom and me, so he’d have full access to each of us.

He didn’t want the covers on, so he kicked them off of both of us, effectively chilling us both.

He rolled around, elbows and knees flailing, providing a kinetic counterpoint to the cold.

He touched his mom’s face, poked her ribs, pounded on her belly. He elbowed me in the eye socket, grabbed my nose, and inserted his finger in my ear.

His mom picked him up and rolled him over onto her side, mostly to keep him away from me. He waited until mommy was quiet and still, and then tried to slide off in order to escape from our room and return to his sisters. She grabbed him just in time and held firm.

He wriggled free from her weakening grasp and climbed over her again in order to torment me some more.

I tried to remain motionless, in order to provide proper example for him. I had hoped he would get the point of this whole “lying still” thing. Even with my eyes closed, I could feel his gaze burning into the side of my head, could sense a mischievous grin spreading across his face. His arm snaked out and slid over my face ever so slowly, and then his fingers closed around my nose again.

My hand shot up with ninja-like speed and grabbed his arm. “Michael, no. You go to sleep,” I said, growling.

“buuuuuuwwwaaaAAAAAAAAAA!” he cried, obviously tired and horribly offended that I would refuse his kindness.

“Come on, Michael. Snuggle with mommy,” his mom says, returning to her basic axiom that when daddy’s sleep is jeopardized, Michael should be kept out of his reach.

While I lay there fuming, I was inspired to invent safe and effective alternatives to chloroform. Visions of a brainwave-altering LED strobe and a concentrated brew of chamomile, valerian root and blue vervain circle my mind. There has to be a way of consistently getting a kid to fall asleep that doesn’t involve a rubber mallet.

Whether he was still flopping around after I finally fell asleep, I do not know.

But after what felt like a brief, dreamless sleep, I was suddenly awake again, the room brightening to the mounting glow of the dawn. One of the great joys of visiting here is seeing the sunrise. The view of the northeast horizon from this bedroom was unsurpassed, and it would be only a few minutes before the sun would rise over the hills in the distance.

As I stood there staring out the window, a brief green flash heralded the rising of the sun as it finally peeked up over the hill.

Though I felt like I’d gotten no sleep at all, I was definitely awake for the day. My wife and son lay there peacefully, asleep at last. They didn’t wake up for another hour or so.

My wife informed me later that she probably got three hours of sleep.

Not a good way to start the day: sore, exhausted, and still bone-rattled and delirious from the previous day’s trip.

But today was a special one, and my wife and I knew we needed to buck up and deal.