Baby's First Road Trip

Grandpa Mike introduces Sophia to John Deere - a truly superior brand of heavy construction equipment.

I've come into this parenting experience with a huge variety of erroneous preconceptions, each foolishly misguided in its own inimitable way. Chief among those is my tendency to overrate the importance of physiological factors in a baby's behavior.

You know, like if you feed the baby enough, she must inevitably fall asleep. Or that since most babies enjoy napping on their stomach, Sophia will always enjoy it. Or that since driving around the city in half-hour chunks has always been enough to conk her out, an automobile ride of any length would inevitably leave her knocked out for as long as the drive continued.

Um, no.

Last week I brought Leigh and Sophia along on a business trip to Portland to stay with my parents while I worked, and Sophia took full advantage of her latest opportunity to prove me utterly wrong.

A round trip that normally takes me roughly five hours total ballooned to more than eight hours with the young one aboard. Sophia kicked off the first half of each trip with a cacaphony of crying and caterwauling that led to an inordinate amount of time spent breast-feeding and calming a screaming baby in a variety of locales - outside small-town McDonald's restaurants being eyed by the local youth in their lowered Chevy S-10s; parked in rural gas station parking lots hoping not to be disturbed; or changing Sophia in grimy, institutional rest areas.


Grandma Cathy enjoys some quality time with the newest member of the family.

Truth be told, Sophia did very well considering her youth and the length of each trip; in the second half of each leg, the white noise and motion of the car eventually managed to cajole her to sleep. Still, my dangerously ignorant assumption that (car)+(baby)=(guaranteed sleeping baby) has been forever dispelled.

This is all just in time, of course, for us to repeat the trip next week so that Leigh and Sophia can stay with my folks in the Portland area while I fly to California for my last trip there with Parts & People.

The excellent thing is that both Leigh and Sophia had time to spend some time with my folks; Leigh had the benefit of helping hands more competent than mine, and my folks got to spend some time with the two beautiful women with whom I have the pleasure to live.


Sophia takes advantage of some "tummy time" at Grandma & Grandpa's house.