Vacations with Grandma or How I Drove Myself Crazy

Have you ever done something you know will be long, torturous and yet fun all at the same time? I have. I vacationed with my mother. I should have been warned when my Dad and husband suddenly had to "work" and couldn't possibly get away for a week with us. At the time, I figured they just wanted a vacation also-but a vacation from us.

Turns out, I was right. Sort of.

Day one of our weeklong travel odyssey to the wilds of Southern California began at Mom's place, loading the car. I swear this is the same woman who traveled across country with 3 children, 2 dogs and a husband in a 70's station wagon every summer of my childhood. We had nothing but food, a few cans of Fresca and my Dad's 8-tracks of Frank Sinatra to entertain us. If my sisters and I got antsy while sitting in the backseat crushed together for 8 hours a day, we poked each other until my Dad finally stopped the car and threatened to strap one of us to the roof until we reached our destination.

Things have certainly changed.

For our trip, Mom packed a large suitcase, an overnight bag, a makeup case, a cooler, a mysterious plastic bag filled with other plastic bags, a 12-pack of toilet paper, 7 hardback books, an iPod, an iPad, a travel pillow and blanket, a first aid kit and a 4 pack of Red Bull.

And that was just her baggage. Junior and I got to squeeze our tiny, single suitcase in the back of the SUV. Of course, all that stuff was to drive from my mom's home in Central California to L.A. It's a 4-hour drive-and that's with traffic. It took longer to load the car with my mom's junk than it actually took to drive to Southern California.

But once we spent a day loading, we were on our way. And it was Junior's lucky day indeed, because being the youngest and (in my opinion) most spoiled grandchild, it turned out that the iPod, and iPad were purely for his amusement (no, he didn't get to keep them). And for my amusement? I got to drive. With my mom sitting next to me.

Now you'd think that this would be fun. That we'd talk and laugh and plan shopping trips. And we did. But all that talking, laughing and planning would be interrupted by my mother who apparently has forgotten that I know how to drive. And that's why she felt the need every 15 minutes or so to ask me if I'd checked my rear view mirror, or to remind me to use my blinker or tell me to change lanes, or check my speed or simply make me so completely insane that I finally threatened to pull the car over and strap her to the roof.

Let me tell you, I was dead serious. I planned to use the mysterious plastic bags as ropes.

But despite my mother's careful planning, she did forget one thing. A map. Turns out neither one of us knew how to get to Southern California. Look, I assumed she knew. After all, she used to live there. I was born there. One of my sisters was born there. But she didn't know-apparently she sleeps her way to So Cal whenever she and Dad travel there. And asking Mom to use the navigation app on her phone was not going to work. She kept trying to make it find Starbucks. Do you know how many Starbucks there are on a 4 hour drive in California? Millions. Possibly billions. So I just pointed the car south on the freeway and hoped for the best. Luckily for us, all roads really do lead to Southern California.

Once we got to L.A.-without once even looking in the cooler or breaking open the 12-pack of toilet paper-we made it to our hotel without getting lost, a major miracle. On the hand, you should have seen the bellhop's face when he opened the back of the car and my mom's overnight bag popped out and whacked him in the head. Fortunately, my mom is prepared for that. Turns out that's what the first aid kit is for. And those mystery bags? Um, no. Sorry. I still don't know what they were for.

But once there, we spent a long week having fun in the sun. Okay, there were a few mishaps and some cranky days. And there was, of course, the long drive back to my mom's house where she spent hours checking my speed, reminding me to use my blinker and making me detour to every Starbucks she could find, but once I got her strapped to that roof, the drive home was a piece of cake.

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