Going on a road trip with the Mr. is always a challenge. It begins when we decide we are going to go visit our son or my mother. First there is the decision on what route to take. I hate driving on the interstate. Boring beyond words, especially in southeastern Arkansas. It is so flat there it makes Oklahoma look like it has mountains. The Mr. however, loves to drive on the interstate because he can drive faster than on regular state roads. He doesn’t care about the scenery or small towns. But that is because he gets tunnel vision and becomes totally focused on getting from point A to point B as fast as possible.

Because he is driving, he has something to concentrate on. I am one of those people who gets miserably car sick. I can’t so much as read a map in the moving car without my stomach trying to turn inside out. So I am sitting in the passenger seat with nothing to do but look out the window. I can try to have a conversation with the Mr. but his brain generally isn’t into it. I get bored fast on the interstate. On the state highways, there are things to see like odd small towns, landscapes, and the occasional animal. Sometimes I get to drive if we are on state roads, mostly though, the Mr. drives. Not because he likes to, and not because I am a bad driver, I am actually better at it than him. But, I get tired easily, so I don’t often get to chose the route.

The second issue, once in the car, is the music. The rule in our family is the driver gets to pick the music. Except he doesn’t choose music, he listens to talk radio. Which is fine for a bit, but on an eight hour drive, it gets old and repetitive. With satellite radio, there are hundreds of choices for music. And we have the MP3 options as well. If he does choose a music station, it stays on that station no matter what they play. I, however, like to switch stations -a lot. Why listen to a song that is boring or by someone you can’t stand when there is so much to choose from? But the Mr. hates it when I do that. He also hates the music turned up loud. Why the heck bother to have it on if you can barely hear it? Makes it hard to sing along.

The third issue, do we stop for the night or just keep going? Its a toss up whether the Mr. will stop or not. I can pull the “I don’t feel well” card and he will stop no matter how close we are to the destination. Sometimes, I just get worn out and claustrophobic being stuck in a car for hours on end. We generally manage about eight hours in the car before I start getting stressed and antsy. The Mr. will keep driving until he is too tired to see straight or we get there.

The fourth issues, one that many women of a certain age deal with is the bathroom stops. Look, a woman my age has a bladder the size of a walnut, and we have to have a pit stop every hour or so. We hold it as long as possible, really we do. We can’t help it if that means we stop fifty miles down the road from the last stop or two hundred. Either we don’t drink anything and dehydrate, or we have to stop as often as our body demands. And no, we can’t just stop on the side of the road like guys can, not and be comfortable, private, or safe. So just get used to a pit stop every hour or so, or have a dehydrated, hateful witch on your hands. Your choice. The Mr. stops. He knows better than to suggest anything else.

We haven’t been on a long road trip in a long time. We try to keep it within a day’s drive when we go on short vacations. Once we retire, I want to travel to the seven states we have never been to out of the fifty in the US. Some how I don’t know that we will do that and keep from annoying each other. I guess we will have to give it a go and see how it works out. One thing for sure, I am going to drive as much as possible, take back roads, and turn up the music while I switch stations regularly. The Mr. can just deal with it.