Most people will tell you.  "You really don't want to fly by yourself with a 2 year old.  Do you?  Are you feverish?"  Noone really told me this.  I heard more of, "Ohhhhh....you're going to do just fine!"  And it was said in that Kindergarten teacher voice.  You know....the one that implies you're three years old and a bit dim.

At any rate, I happily agreed to visit my mother in Ohio and be flown back home with my 18 month old daughter, Cali.  Cali is an unusually content and well behaved child.  So I figured this would be a breeze.  Prior to leaving, I purchased one of those child harness contraptions with a leash.  This one sported a monkey which  attached to the child's back and snapped in the front.  The monkey's tail provided the "leash". 

While we waited to board the plane, Cali decided to completely fall out of her right mind.  When a dog gets carried away on a leash....you tug the leash to regain control, right?  I figured the same idea went for children's harnesses as well.  Umm....no.  My tug initiated my daughter to seize backwards and onto the floor with great force, while screaming "Whhhhooooooaaaaaa." 

I am quite certain that several passengers were text messaging the authorities to promptly send child services.  But it didn't end there.  She threw fruit loops in my face.  She stuck crayons up her nose.  She tore pages out of her coloring books.  She spit juice on me.  She laughed like a crazy person.  Meanwhile, I was sweating profusely and cursing my  mother for thinking up such a ludicrious arrangement.

Finally an airport worker walked up to us and frankly declared, "Girl, get your baby and c'mon."  My little barbarian turned into a turtle dove as we boarded the plane (her first ride).  She clung to me like a spider monkey for the entire flight, sleeping like a baby without so much as a peep. 

So all's well that ends well.  But I'm gonna have this nervous twitch for a few months, I'm sure.

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