diamond shoes, I guess

[flea]

mr. flea and I are on IM trying to work out what travel we will do to see our families in the next little while. We are caught in the trap of living far away from our families, so car travel isn't a practical option. We have 4 people who need plane seats, plus we pretty much need a spare car available at our destination, or a rental. We live 90 minutes from the nearest airport. We have very little vacation time. mr. flea's family wants us to go to Ohio for Easter, at $350 per person, 8 hours travel time (4 in the air, plus travel and check in time at both ends). For a total of 36 hours with his family. We are supposed to go to my half-brother's wedding in NH in May, similar issues, though it is far enough out that we can probably get nonstop flights at a decent price, more like $230 each, and take more time, because of Memorial Day. And my mother threatens to sell the Cape Cod house if we don't come this summer, so we're talking about going the last week of June/first week of July.

I'm just overwhelmed by it right now, and miserable. Imagine if we lived within a 3-4 hour drive of all our family members. Our lives would be so different.

Comments

[gchick.livejournal.com]

I don't think this is a diamond shoes problem at all (it is a first-world problem, which is how I misremembered your subject line before I switched tabs to come back and reply, but in a whole different sense than we usually mean it*). Access to family is all kinds of important; travel schedules and budgets that blow the whole vacation will only add to the stress rather than allowing family time to be the supporting thing it really ought to be; we didn't evolve for the kind of distances and schedules where going the fast way means that you spend a full day traveling for a day and a half on the ground. Your stress at all this is completely understandable and your pinchy diamond shoes are the kind that aren't.


* (In that to-the-hour vacation scheduling and widely scattered locations for professional rather than refugee reasons are a very first world thing. But still not in the sense that such problems comprise whining about one's luxuries!)

[noradeirdre.livejournal.com]

Oof. I would ditch the Ohio visit. And I'm sorry your mother is pulling a guilt trip on you about the Cape Cod house. Would it be horrible if she did actually sell it?

Honestly, Phoebe, you can only do what you can do. And you are allowed to say "no." *You're* the one with the small kids, and limited time and money.

I see this happening with my sister too- she lives in Ohio and the rest of the family is in the Northeast... so forgive me if I am projecting!

[jonquil.livejournal.com]

By the way, I have been known to say "The kids aren't really big enough to handle the airplane trip yet."

[serrana.livejournal.com]

We don't go to L.A. for exactly this reason. We explained to C's parents that if they want us down there, our costs for a trip are over $2500 and we would need financial help to afford it; they decided they'd rather come up here.

As the kids get older, it may be feasible to send them for solo visits with distant relatives, but right now? No, the grandparents can come to us.

[jonquil.livejournal.com]

Oh, God, I know that feeling. ((tacklehug)) I am so sorry.

[cashmerepett.livejournal.com]

I totally understand your problem. For some bizarre reason, I feel compelled to keep dragging my kids across three states to see family. We're lucky if we get two or three visits a year from our families--and yet I do twice that, easily.

Moving from a four hour drive to an eight hour drive has made me less hesitant about saying "no." Because really, when the travel time equals your visit time--it's so not worth it.

Not to mention money and stress, etc.

[forodwaith.livejournal.com]

Preach it, sister.

And I totally agree with your cost-benefit analysis of the Easter trip.

[mightyurchin.livejournal.com]

This is what we have to look forward to... we've done general thinking about how to manage - just in terms of time - visiting various family once we can't pop down to visit one set of grandparents for a weekend every now and again. Sigh.