Most of us have travel stories to tell. Most of my stories involve my kids when they were growing up and we would take summer vacations together. I remember one trip when my youngest girls were maybe ten. The first leg of the trip took us to Kansas City where we took the kids to Worlds of Fun and a Royals baseball game. It was lots of fun. My wife, Kelly and I had just married, and we had actually used part of a wedding gift certificate to buy the girls some new pillows. We took them on the trip figuring the girls could enjoy them instead of some of the rock-hard pillows in certain hotels. After a few days, we left Kansas City and headed to Branson for some time on the water at Table Rock Lake. When we got to our lodging at Branson, we quickly noticed the pillows were nowhere to be found. The girls had forgotten and left them behind. I was so unhappy thinking, “We had used a gift meant for Kelly and me to buy you all something and you didn’t even care enough to make sure you packed up the pillows.” I’m pretty sure I made the girls feel really bad and that ruined at least one day of our trip.
On another summer vacation to Kansas City, I remembered we had a large number of bags that wouldn’t all fit in our new minivan. The vehicle had a luggage rack, so my wife took one of the kid’s bags and secured it to the rack. We were headed home and hadn’t traveled very far on Interstate 70, when all of a sudden, the bag came loose and went flying through the air almost hitting a car behind us. It was a high traffic area near downtown KC, so of course the bag got run over at least three times before we could retrieve it. I’ll never forget running out onto the interstate and dodging cars trying to get this bag. The kids all thought this was the funniest thing they had ever seen. I wasn’t laughing and let my wife know what a shabby job she had done attaching the bag to the rack. All this made for another fun day of traveling when she and I didn’t speak until we reached Emporia.
Most of us know traveling can be a stressful time for many reasons and those are just two stories where I blew my top and ruined a small part of our vacations. Now, the girls SHOULD HAVE remembered to take their pillows and maybe my wife could have done a better job with the bag, but I could have done a better job with how I expressed my disappointment. Life is too short to hold onto disappointments and regrets. Sometimes we just need to let go of our anger. The Proverbs have much to say about anger including this…. ”Whoever is patient has great understanding but one who is quick-tempered displays folly.” (Proverbs 14:29) Vacations are special times to spend with your family and friends and life is about making memories. So, when you travel don’t let anger or disappointment steal your joy. Travel light and leave your anger at home.
– Rev. Dave Poteet, Pastor of Congregational Care
