We started our journey Friday morning. While I had grand ambitions to leave between 8 and 9 a.m., we pulled onto the Interstate at almost 11:30. Oh well. We had a few stops between our house and the highway. One of those definitely paid off.

We stopped at the local library. We quickly scanned the available CD audiobooks and found a couple that were just a half hour shy of our journey each way. We don’t own an in-car DVD player because we can’t find a way that all four children can view it well from their seats. And no one wants to buy extra complaining on any road trip. Audio books, on the other hand, are nice because the car has speakers near each seat.

The other benefit, for us, is that the older boys can continue to play video games (without sound) while listening to the story. This really helps Yoshi, who is a very active thinker, and gives him a place to focus his thoughts.

My other secret weapon for a drive with conscious children is a brown paper bag full of snacks. Pretzels with cheese, fruit snacks, Cheeze-Its, mini-cookies are all favorites. Depending on the child and packaging, I will re-package hard-to-open or easy-to-spill items into my favorite snack containers. I overfill the bag so to compensate for the bored hunger, “Mom, I dropped my food!” and “I don’t like this” whine. I do limit what drink they have, keeping it to a minimum number of ounces, so that when (not if) they chug, it will hopefully make it through those no-man’s lands without an exit or truck stop without an accident.

Speaking of truck stops, I discovered my best tip yet on the return trip. When traveling alone and outnumbered, I’ll be skipping the major, interstate exit stops and looking for a store on the main street in town instead. Quite by accident, I followed a sign for a Casey’s General Store. The first sign didn’t have mileage on it, and after committing to the exit, I discovered it was 1.25 miles down the road. Just great!

It was a blessing in disguise. Just busy enough to be safe, the locals were kind and courteous, better than hurried travelers near the interstate. The bathrooms were “one seaters” in a small hallway where I could monitor both genders discretely. After grabbing mommy some coffee and checking out with the very friendly cashier, Luigi made the best discovery of the trip – a PAY PHONE! The cashier and I had a good chuckle as the children marveled over this technological wonder that they’d only seen in Daddy’s favorite childhood movies. It was quite the experience for all of us.

We packed ourselves back in the car and a few miles down the road, all four were asleep. We finally arrived home around 11 p.m. at night. Not my favorite, but definitely easier than listening to “Are we there yet?” for hours.

While it wasn’t easy, and I don’t recommend it, there are ways to make traveling alone with children much easier. Relax, be open to change, and have a good attitude. It works for me!

While driving home after my Mac lesson for today, Smells Like Teen Spirit by Nirvana came on the radio in my mini-van. Instinctively, I turned up the volume (to a whopping 15) and added a bit of bass. What happened next was a bit odd, even to me.

A wave of realization washed over me that because I was lightly bobbing my head I must look like I’ve just left the set of “A Night at the Roxbury”. This simply would not do, so I threw caution and good sense to the wind and head-banged as much as legally possible while still driving down the road. As I flipped my recently trimmed curls to and fro I couldn’t help but laugh at myself and what my fellow motorists in their BMW, Audis and Lexus-es (or is it Lexi?) must be thinking. But I didn’t care, it felt good.

Hopefully someone else enjoyed the chuckle at the crazy Hyundai mini-van mom head-banging, but even if they didn’t it was an essential emotional emancipation for me, and will hopefully help me survive my solo-parenting week until hubby’s plane touches down Saturday. If I need another injection, I may just teach my children the meaning of the word “mosh pit”.