Trip, Trap, Trip, Trap

On a trip to see my sister and family in NC last week, we went on a very sweaty hike.  It was a pretty NC hike forested with green trees and carpeted with pine needles. There was some incline and decline and a lake and a whisper of a breeze off the lake which we needed desperately because while it was not incredibly hot, it was insanely humid.  There were a couple of small bridges to cross and as we got to the first one, I did what I always do when crossing a small foot bridge: I said "Trip, trap, trip, trap" and my sister laughed right away and knew I was talking about the troll from "Three Billy Goats Gruff".  (which if you have not read this amazing piece of literature daily to children from the ages of 2-5, you are missing out on a grumpy old troll and some very smart goats and the compulsion to say "trip, trap, trip, trap" any and every time you cross a footbridge.) We hiked on and at the end of the three miles everyone was glad we had a small adventure and I said I only hated five minutes of that hike and we got ice cream to celebrate all the calories we had sweated off.  A perfect Sunday!

At the airport the next day, I was thinking about this trip and other trips to see my sister.  It is always a good trip.  We eat good food and drink great wine and do small adventures and, as it turns out, a lot of sweating.  Hot yoga, hot hikes, etc.  On a trip prior to this one, we drank alot, alot of red wine at night and the next morning went to aerial yoga.  There I was, hungover, and hanging from a silk scarf from the sky while contorting my body into weird positions.  I would file that experience under "do not recommend."  That trip, like this one, was a good trip where I spent time with some of my favorite people.

As I waited at the gate for my plane though, I couldn't help but feel a little trapped.  Trapped among too many people, trapped waiting for things I was not in control of, trapped waiting for a restroom.  I only fly Southwest so I was in trappings that I knew, but traps nonetheless. Trapped waiting for my letter and number.  Trapped waiting for people who haven't flown in twenty years to board and stow their luggage.  I like to sit closer to the front so I often take a middle seat and am trapped between two people I have never seen before.  On both flights, both sets of people were real armrest-hoggers so I felt even more caged. 

Squished between two healthy strangers, I closed my eyes and thought about my Western adventure last year.  A trip to see family and then trapped with the rest of America to seek adventures.  Trip, trap, trip, trap.  I didn't want to experience the beauty of nature or national monuments with other people and especially not hoards of people who obviously hadn't left their own home in ten years and were raising feral children.  I am not sure when the rest of America became so abhorrent to me but it does make me wish I could plan trips when everyone else is too busy to go.  As I write this, I realize I am very similar to the grumpy old troll wondering who is trip, trapping over his bridge.  In my case, I am wondering why all of these people are here too.

Trip, trap, trip, trap.  In order to take a trip, you risk the trap.   Maybe it's the trap of the interstate, or plane delays, or forced small talk with a chatty seat mate.  Maybe it's overpriced food or wondering why you can't have an entire can of Diet Coke and only get that Dixie cup full on the plane.  Maybe it's too many people wanting to do the same things or the hurry up and wait that makes you feel trapped.  In those trapped moments, I like to close my eyes and think of the trip ahead of me or behind me.   When I open them, I can see good things happening in the sea of humanity ahead of me and that helps: people helping strangers, families laughing together, an older couple still holding hands.  

When I fly to Chicago next week to see my person and am so impatient with the trap because I just want to be there and with him already, I will try to think more of the TRIP than the trap.  Because, really, the TRIP always outweighs the trap.  TRIP, trap, TRIP, trap.  Time with people you love, some minor inconveniences, taking adventures and making memories, crying kids on planes, wanting to die at aerial yoga, no arm rests.  I think that in addition to saying "trip, trap, trip, trap" at every footbridge in my life, I will also start saying it as I walk down the jetbridge to my plane.  If nothing else, it will make me think of reading to my kids when they were little or my sister.  And, if I say it out loud, people might think I am really weird and not sit next to me and I can get an armrest!

Always worth the trip and the traps.