Family Vacation and The Dreamer

 

Since it’s almost February my wife, Linda, has started planning our family vacation.  This should be easy, but a month ago I declared that I was going Elk Hunting next fall.  I have not been elk hunting in five years.  Instead, we have taken our children camping for our vacation.  I prefer elk hunting by myself because family camping with a two year old, a four year old and an eight year old is inhumane. 

 

My hunting declaration has caused a major rift between Linda and I.  Her vacation planning involves scheduled activities that will educate and stimulate our children, while giving me bleeding ulcers.   She prefers camping near museums and underwater aquariums and wildlife safaris. I find her very unrealistic.

 

He problem, I told her, is that she is too familial.  Her life is wrapped up in the children and planning memories for them that will last a lifetime. Very noble, except the two and four year old, which constitutes two thirds of our children,  will never remember the vacation because they are too young.  

 

“Well, Wade, (now nine) will remember them.”  She said

 

Great.  Now we're planning our entire vacation for our nine year old. 

 

I am worn out from last years beach camping foray.  We toured a lighthouse, visited an aquariam, and learned about Luis and Clarks' lice.  I mostly remember being grouchy.  Trying to educate and stimulate our children is wiping me out. 

 

“They seem to be stimulated enough if you ask me.  I am oppressed.”  That’s what I told my wife.

 

“Poor baby. You’ve got it so rough.” She said.  Not without a trace of sarcasm.

 

“You’re problem”, she told me, “is that you lived your life backwards.  You had all your fun and freedom when you were young and now that you’re older you are having to settle down and raise a family.  Why cant you just be happy?"

  

This led to the launching of my now famous freedom soliloquy which was spontaneous, yet polished, and not without sounding slightly rehearsed. 

 

"No," I began, which was a very fine beginning on such little notice, "I will never give up. It will always be something with me. I don't want to live in a crowded town and spend my life
driving around fixing peoples windshields, only to spend my entire vacation stimulating my childrens education. I want to do something cool with my life. I want to catch Sailfish in exotic tropical places with weird names. I want to be a mountain man. I want to live in the desert on a big ranch and break horses and fish and hunt and trap coyotes and rope bears! I want to live in the Yukon and hunt Bighorn sheep and Grizzly bears and fly bush planes and trap wolves! I WILL TRAP WOLVES!! I declared dramatically, triumphantly.

“Congratulations.”  She said in her best deadpan voice,  stealing my thunder by interjecting her sardonic wit.  “So do you want to do the aquarium or the wildlife safari?

 

“Wildlife Safari.”  I said.

 

So next summer, you will find me cooped up in our family mini van, driving through a fenced, fake, African wildlife safari adventure, while my wife reads the pamphlet out loud to our children, two of whom will be fighting over a green crayon.  I will be cranky and stressed, yet I will draw in deep drafts of air into my lungs to relieve the stress.  This will be confused with sighing by my family, but it is the sound of me surviving.   

 

In the fall, it is doubtful that I will go Elk hunting because chances for drawing a tag are low for me until the fallowing year.  I neglected to inform my wife of that information.  My argument and thus my freedom soliloquy were birthed strictly from a matter of principal. Never the less, if I have to wait a year I will. 

 

It will all begin with a week long elk hunt. I will drink my coffee over an open fire and shiver in my sleeping bag under a tarp in the snow and walk for days until I am happily exhausted.  Daddy will return from the hunt revived and content. 

 

When the kids are older, they will want to come with me, drawing in their mother, who is happy as long as we are all together. This will continue through the years until it has culminated in our family living deep in a cave in the Northwest Territories, and traveling to tropical islands and finally, finally I will catch sailfish and Break horses and rope bears and trap wolves. I WILL TRAP WOLVES!!