Second Class

When have you felt ordinary?

For most of us it’s a majority of the time, but there are those occasions where you feel special — an upgrade at a hotel, priority lane access at an airport (or perhaps amusement park), or flying first class.

I did some travel during a Spring Break week and had many families on my flight as my destination wasn’t far from a popular amusement park. A young boy, probably 5 or so, was walking down the aisle with his mom. She was directing him to aisle 19. He asked if they were sitting in first class. He was already in the coach section when he asked this question. His mom said, “no, those are the seats at the front of the plane.” He wasn’t sure where the front of the plane was and asked if the seats were the furthest seats in the back of the plane. His mom laughed and asked if he’d remembered the larger seats they had already passed. He then asked, “are we second class?” Many of us laughed. Someone said, “it feels like it, right?” And another commented, “at least we’re not third.” 😂

We don’t often experience situations where we’re made to feel special, but even if you’re not flying first class, the fact that we can afford to be on a plane and go somewhere (for whatever reason) is pretty special.

For those on Spring Break, enjoy your adventure. I’ll be off next week experiencing our final school Spring Break and back towards the end of the month.

Off They Go

When my boys were young we came across the book Off We Go to Mexico by Laurie Krebs, a fun book taking the reader through some of the wonders of Mexico. It starts with, “Off we go, off we go, off we go to Mexico.” The kids loved the repetitiveness of ‘off we go,’ and we applied it freely for any adventure we were going to have — ‘off we go, off we go, off we go to…the park, on a walk, or the zoo’ — you get the drift. Everyone loved the silliness of it, and it did make our journey feel more like a try adventure when the sing-song intro of ‘off we go’ got us started.

We took a trip in eastern Canada via rail. Our youngest planned logistics for our trip, with cities we’d visit, days we’d stay, and ideas for things to do including visiting family, seeing some sites, and building in ‘free time’ for everyone to be able to do what they wanted including relaxing or doing something on your own.

Our youngest really wanted to explore the metro system of one of the cities we visited by himself. He’d previously had done this without issue so we allowed him to go off and do it again with parameters — keeping us posted, updating us on his whereabouts, and when he’d be back. He went off on his adventure but shared he was coming back to the hotel earlier than we expected. “Everything okay?,” I asked. “Yes,” he replied. “Did something happen?” I asked. “No,” he shared, “I just got anxious and scared and bored.” His awareness of his own feelings always blows me away. “Okay,” I said, “you sure you’re okay? You can come meet us?” He declined and said he’d see us back at the hotel.

We talked at dinner about his day. He shared where he’d gone, and the routes he hadn’t. “Are you disappointed you didn’t go everywhere you wanted?” and he said, “I can do it when I come back.” We have no plans as a family to go there again, but my son does. I loved he can visualize himself getting back there.

I’m so proud of my son and his desire to break out on his own, and find his own adventures. I’m so grateful I’ve been able to not let my fears of letting him g(r)ow hold him back (not always easy). The words keep running through my mind every time he decides a new adventure (local or away) he plans to take. Off he goes, off he goes, off he goes to…

What adventures are you and your kid(s) having? Any books that your kid(s) haven’t grown out of?