Since our return from Seattle on Tuesday I have been asked “how was your trip?” more times than I’ve bothered to count. Usually that question is immediately followed by “Did you have fun?” These questions seem easy to answer, but they’re not. How was my trip? Did I have fun? Well there was definitely some fun involved, but I can’t say the whole trip was an unmitigated delight. I could have done without getting lost 3 of the 4 times I drove in the Seattle area. I learned a lot the challenges of combining a family vacation with a business trip. Some things worked other things didn’t. The kids and I got to go new places and see things we’d never seen before. Seeing those places with my kids was really good, but it was a very different experience from going by myself. This trip was not often relaxing, but it was definitely a good thing to do. I fully intend to do “vacation to new places” again, although I think next time I’ll arrange for Howard to be on vacation too. He worked the convention all weekend.
All the places we went and things that we saw sparked a bazillion thoughts in my brain. There were many blogworthy ideas and events. Thus far I haven’t blogged any of them, but I took notes and over the next week or so I’m hoping to go through them all and get the entries written. I’ve discovered that I really need mental space to process my experiences and to write about them. During the whole trip to Seattle I ran from event to event until I crashed into bed at night. Even in the times that I scheduled as “down times” for the kids, I was still on duty watching to make sure that kids didn’t drown in the hotel swimming pool or squabble over property rights. It wasn’t until the long drive home that my brain was able to process all the things that happened. I drifted half asleep while my mind wandered then I’d wake up and make notes about my brain wanderings. Then I’d drift some more, then write more notes.
Upon my arrival home I had to unpack everything and re-settle us all into being at home. That was Tuesday. Yesterday I had to spend all day catching up on accounting and the quarterly financial reports required by the state and federal governments. Today I am going to do some spring cleaning and I’m going to do some blogging. Fortunately the spring cleaning keeps my hands busy, but allows my brain space to roam and compose entries. So the two things should go well together. Perhaps when I’m done writing all the entries I’ll finally have a concise answer for “How was your trip?”