girls roadtrip

N and I are about to embark on our first serious mother-daughter road trip and I have to admit that I'm a little nervous.  It reminds me of how I can kayak home at night and feel fine, but as soon as I have N in the boat I'm overwhelmed by nerves.  Being responsible for someone else, not just anyone but the one person in this world who I would give my life for, pushes my safety boundaries.  Having said that, I keep reminding myself that I'm raising her to be self-sufficient and aware, so she's much easier to travel with now.

Take for example when we fly together now: she knows that I'm prone to panic attacks and knows how to help me through them.  That knowledge unto itself decreases my stress level which in turn decreases the potential for me to have a panic attack.  It's a beautiful circle that feeds itself and grows instead of feeding ON itself.

So back to our roadtrip.... we've chosen to go as far as northern California.  The idea for the trip has been primarily N's idea and I've embraced it just in the past few days.  Dirt bag camping except for three nights at a Keple-recommended campground near Monterey.  I've looked up where the WalMarts are along our route in locations where I might hit the wall from a driving standpoint.  There's something satisfying about peeing in the landscaping of a WalMart parking lot amongst all the fancy campers.

I'm looking forward to the funniest things: standing beside the truck with bleary eyes brushing our teeth together, those conversations that only happen when you spend lots of uninterrupted time together, taking turns cooking on my ancient MSR stove.... Mostly I'm looking forward to having N to myself for 10 days.  It's been a really busy summer and we need this time to reconnect before she heads into grade 10.