Flying by the seat of our pants

I had chills thinking about the flight this past Christmas Eve, a three-jump journey to the Duluth grandma and her growing reunion of family.

Last year’s jaunt to a different city for the same jamboree had been disastrous.

Back then our Ittybit was an “infant in arms,” screaming herself to sleep during each torturous descent. She had gotten her first stomach bug two days into the dream Boulder “vacation,” and each bout sent me into the shower and then directly to the laundry. When the bug spread to others all eyes were upon us. I willed myself invisible. It didn’t work.

By the time we returned from the holiday I had a new understanding of motherhood: It is the phase in one’s life when a vacation seems more work than the average day-to-day drudgery.

This Christmas, as we waited in the airport terminal with a wriggling toddler before the first leg of our trip, I caught a reflection of myself in the glass as I looked out the window at the empty slot where our plane should be. My hair had sprouted more grays.

According to the tickets, that empty space at the end of the jetway wouldn’t be filled for another two hours. My hope for a harmonious trip had faded along with my hair color.

As the minutes ticked away by the month, I was sure the meager supplies of diversions I’d packed would not be enough to sustain us for the next eight hours.

Just 16 minutes into the wait, I had already pulled out all the stops.

Glitter, crayons and snack particles littered our wake as we moved from one gate to the next trying to entertain the 2-year-old dervish whirling between us.

Narrowing my eyes I began sizing up my fellow travelers, hoping to enlist their unwitting assistance to make time move faster.

Who amongst them could help in this diabolical plot to entertain a toddler once the pay phone buttons had lost their luster? Who might scrunch their nose and walk brusquely to the security guard and complain?

I sidled up to a “Charlotte York-ish” young woman and her traveling companion, a puppy packed impeccably in a comfy carry-on kennel. I know it’s a Cavalier King Charles spaniel from watching “Sex and the City,” but I ask anyway to make small talk. While I was thrilled that this Charlotte turned out to be even more gracious than her fictional twin, I was puzzled as to why Ittybit wouldn’t go anywhere near the sweet little creature.

Then it hits me: “Oh that dog is tiny and cute. … Your dogs are large drooling beasts, who merely tolerate you because of what drops from your highchair. You don’t know what it is and think, judiciously, ‘approach with caution’.”

Of course, she thinks nothing of the death-defying pre-flight flight we took near Gate 7. Her worried father, however, considered contacting FAA (and OSHKOSH) to find out the stress endurance of overalls as I swung her by the seat of her pants, five inches from the ground, every so often setting her down gently on her tummy while I rest. He decided to let it ride after she squeals delightedly, “Do it again! Do it AGAIN!”

Eventually the meter runs out on this amusement too, and I scrape the bottom of my bag for a miracle.

Glue stick, coloring book … hmmm … where’s that Skymall magazine?

For the next hour Ittybit happily calls out the colors she requires as I rip them from the insipid catalog. As she smothers Elmo with a green, floppy flyer pillow torn from page 6, I rejoice. “There is still hope.”