Drama Daddy: How I Spent My Summer Vacation

Packing. And unpacking. That’s how it felt anyway.

In the past few weeks of our post-Kindergarten, first ever school-free summer (since you need to have started school to be out of school), my daughter Clare, my wife and I spent a week vacationing at the beach and took a few other day trips to places like parks, museums and zoos. For the whole summer, it seemed, we were either getting ready to go somewhere or just getting back.

It may sound like I’m exaggerating, but you parents know that packing and preparing to go out—even for a day—can just about fill another day. You know you do.

When I was single, I’d leave the house for a day with no more than the clothes I was wearing and my wallet. What guy needed anything else? For an overnight trip, I’d drop a change of clothes and a toothbrush into a backpack. Going away for a week didn’t take much more than a bigger backpack. It made getting away a lot easier and more spontaneous. Now, with only one kid, I take more going out for a few hours than I used to take for a weekend away. Going somewhere overnight with my daughter is the equivalent of packing for a week as a single guy. And a week’s vacation with kids—that’s the equivalent of moving. I’m serious. I used to move apartments with less than we take on vacation now. I could fit all of it into the back of a van—and I didn’t need one of those cartop Big Mac-type carriers for extra stuff.

The way I see it, people fall into a few different categories of packing for vacations. There are the early planners—they may or may not make a list, but they always have a solid idea of what they’re going to bring and usually start collecting it early. There are precision packers—militant organizers who (in their opinion) pack exactly the right amount into a suitcase in exactly the right configuration. Precision packers can also fit suitcases, bags, toys and beach chairs into the back of a car with all the mad skills required of an extreme game of Tetris. There are take-everything packers—they might start with a list or might not, but they end up emptying the house and squeezing everything they own into every last nook and cranny of a suitcase. I guess you never know when you’re going to need three different scents of nail polish remover or textures of hair gel in an emergency, and you can’t trust that you’ll be able to buy these things in some remote uncivilized outback in the United States where you’re taking the kids. Finally, there are the last minute packers—these procrastinators might take too much or too little, they might even just throw their things into a shopping bag or something else grabbed at the last minute, but they always wait until just before leaving to get anything together. Obviously, people can fall into a few different categories. I, for example, am an early-planning, take-everything, last minute packer. I decide early what I’ll need, but I wait until the day we’re leaving to get it together, and end up bringing a lot more than we’ll use—but not always everything we need.

To offset my last minute leanings, I try to plan ahead more and more. Even to go out for a day, I track down the backpack the night before and make a mental list of what we might need: sunscreen, camera, snacks, a jacket or umbrella if it might be cool or rainy, maybe even a change of clothes. I still wait until the last minute to stuff it all together though. And I usually forget something—like some napkins or wipes to clean up after a popsicle or donut.

Earlier this week, Clare and I met a friend of mine and her son for a day out at a museum. As I was complaining that I should have brought something to wipe a chocolate milk mustache off of my daughter’s face, my friend offered me one from her bag. I guess this is where I should apologize to more organized dads for furthering the stereotype that mothers are better prepared for anything than fathers are; it probably comes a woman’s experience with packing anything she’d need into a purse or handbag. My friend also offered a suggestion. So they can get out quickly for a day, she said, she keeps a bag packed and always ready to go.

A bag always ready to go? This is my first summer as a stay-at-home Dad, but I probably should have thought of that myself. It could make getting away a lot quicker and spontaneous. And I’d spend less time packing and unpacking. Not very clever of me to not think of that myself, was it?