Break has nearly arrived! The time has finally come to think about venturing homeward for the holidays. But the excitement of going home is always dampened by the thought of the travelling that it takes to actually get there. Whether it’s a road trip or plane ride, bike ride or light jog, it is the last barrier between you and your couch and home cooked food, lots of it.
If you are flying home, you will undoubtedly be faced with airport confusion and consequent stress. For example, when you realize you are in terminal B but your next flight leaves from terminal A, and you are stumped on how Delta could have assumed that you were capable of traveling a whole four letters of the alphabet in fifteen minutes through a crowded airport when you’re stuck behind the Orlando bound family of 5 fully decked out in mickey mouse gear, with the youngest screaming for dear life while the oldest rips the bow out of her hair and the middle child trips over her shoe laces… oh how I love the holidays.
Ways to make this better: Reward yourself once you finally get to the correct gate by buying a pack of Trident Layers and the latest edition of Cosmo to read on the plane. This can get awkward when you get a middle seat between two middle aged men, but just keep in mind that you will probably never see them again!
If you are road tripping, whether for half hour or 15+ hours, car rides really never seem to end. During your travels you should prepare yourself for back pain, radio static, hunger, an uncomfortably full bladder, road rage, mental exhaustion, and the feeling of near complete resentment for the person who called shotgun right before you. No matter which direction you are leaving from campus, the central Ohio landscape that we all must suffer through in the first two ours of the trip is far from scenic and will leave you questioning how you spend the majority of your time in the middle of absolute nowhere.
Ways to make this better: Whenever I am driving through farmland and fields upon fields, it often rules out some of my favorite car games such as the Alphabet game because the lack of civilization often comes with a lack of road signs. Alternatively, I would recommend counting silos! Yes this seems weird but there are actually a lot of them! And it helps you develop a sort of appreciation for them and their abnormal shape and ambiguous purpose. Or you could always get a round of the geography game going. How to play: someone says the name of a state or a country and the next person has to say one that start with the last letter of the previous one. This can be super fun until you run out of countries that start with A…. then you’re screwed.
Either way, travel safe and always remember to wear your seat belt, don’t sit in the front seat if you are under 60 pounds, watch out for deer, don’t text and drive, tired driving is worse than drunk driving, keep your small carryon COMPLETELY under the seat in front of you, secure your own oxygen mask before assisting others and always give consent before sitting in an exit row. HAPPY HOLIDAYS EVERYONE!