My vacation countdown app informs me that we have 17 hours before takeoff, which means that I'm in the middle of what my husband lovingly refers to as The Great Repack.
Being a somewhat forgetful person but also a fairly organized one, I try to head off catastrophe by starting the vacation packing process well in advance to give myself enough time. Time to come back to the suitcase, take stock of what I've entered and add what else needs to come that didn't make it the first time.
It's really not unlike my writing process.
But the arrival of my children has complicated, or shall I say, grown ever more encompassing, as I'm now mom, also known as keeper of all things. My boys don't miss a beat if their dad doesn't know where something is, but they grow highly offended if I can't seem to place my finger on where the Green Goblin LEGO figure's head rolled off to.
So this week I started the dozen loads of laundry in the final countdown event in between work and the last few school dropoffs and pickups so we could tick off the brackets.
Being the mom means I hold the crucial information -- I know the select shirts that each of our sons will wear and why, which gives me the key to the whole host of if-then scenarios.
My 3-year-old, if left to his own devices, will only wear a few right now: the Captain America shirt, obviously, the one with the monster truck, and he loves his all-green baby Yoda shirt so much that we had to buy a second one to trick him into having a fourth regular shirt.
Designs on the front are an important start for him, sure, but so is texture apparently. When I grew sick of his four T-shirts recently I dragged out an adorable gray v-neck with a kitty design on the front. Elliott loves kitties, but he still vetoed the shirt until I brushed it on his arm to demonstrate its nice, pre-broken-in feel. "Oooo, it's so soft!" he said, and then on it went. Fifth shirt, check.
I'm not sure how he did it, but one day my husband got him to wear the crocodile printed tee, so there's our sixth. A couple of novelty shirts are just fun enough to be tolerated on his person long enough to cover him while in public -- a dinosaur with a zipper mouth and a hippo whose jaw hinges open, revealing a little fish inside.
And that's one more person packed!
My 4-year-old is admittedly easier since he grew a sudden affinity for athletic brand clothing, fascinated with "NB" New Balance, "UA" Under Armor and that weird little checkmark, the Nike swoosh, since he sees it on my running shoes. Although a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles or Pokemon shirt doesn't hurt every once in a while.
I'll pack my clothes, but they're merely an afterthought to the books that go in my bag. As I close my laptop, I look lovingly at my bookcase to consider which ones will make the trip with me. Will it be "Modern Lovers" by Emma Straub and "Honor" by Thrity Umrigar? Or should I leave them behind so I have room enough for Jonathan Franzen's "Crossroads" (finally)?
Whatever I decide, you better believe my Kindle and its charger are already sticking out of the top of my suitcase, since there's nothing more relaxing than packing light and having plenty of choices for what story suits your mood that day.