Getting Out of Dodge

Our days before leaving Madison were hard and crazy. We had packing to do for our trip as well as the cleaning and packing up of our house to prepare it for our tenants. Mike described it like climbing up the stairs to the tallest water slide at the water park: it is hot and hard and filled with anticipation. We had decided it would be too hard to leave our house for a year early in the morning so we opted to spend our final night at the Hulan’s house. It was a good choice. By 6pm we had cleaned and packed our house, it was finally time to go. Lily was very upset to leave one of her particularly large stuffed animals. It was as if she had transferred her fear and anxiety to “Peppermint”. When she started to cry, so did I. Thankfully a little TV and dinner at the Hulan’s house improved all of our moods. Our final hours of Madison daylight were spent with ice cream cones watching the sunset over Lake Mendota at Memorial Union.

Our alarm went off at about 5am. I rolled over, took a deep breath and snuggled up to Mike. In the minutes before we got up we talked about what had brought us to this day. I asked, “When did we started all this?” He said, “In 1996 when I applied to graduate school.” He is right. While it took a lot of logistical work to make our sabbatical happen, the real work was Mike’s PhD and the past seven years of teaching and research.

We had packed four large duffels, four roller bags and four backpacks for our year. I was very anxious about whether or not it would all fit in a car, taxi, etc. Our first step was getting it all into Chuck Hulan’s car for our trip to the airport. It worked. We left Madison at 6:45am.I was sneaky and left my iPhone on so I could take a couple of aerial pictures of Madison as we took off. Our first stop was Maine for Mike’s family reunion.

Our travels to Maine went smoothly. It was clear that all of our luggage (now fondly known “all our crap”) would not fit into a standard rental car so we upgraded to a minivan. It was a bummer to have to spend the extra money, but it just is “the cost of doing business”. We had a great time in Maine. I had been complaining all summer about having to go to Spain via Maine but being there gave us a few days to relax and decompress before diving head first into our new lives. We swam, walked, talked, rock climbed, ate lobster, played and even slept a little. I borrowed Mike’s mother’s car and drove about three hours to Walpole, Maine to see an old friend. There were about 36 members of Mike’s mother’s side of the family at the event. It is a wonderful group and people and amazingly everybody is kind and smart and a pleasure to be with.

During the week Lily had an intermittent belly ache. I chalked it up to stress but by our last night she was in quite a bit of pain. We made the difficult decision to take her to the emergency room (a 45 minute drive in the rain). We were sad to not spend this last evening with family but Lily’s tears pushed us. The doctor initially agreed with our diagnosis but then it turned out the Lily had a UTI. I felt guilty for thinking it was in her head when she really did have something cooking.

Finally the day of our departure arrived. Our first step was to drive five hours to Boston. Check! Our second step was to return our rental car and get all our crap to the international terminal. Check! Our third step was to get through security and have our final meal (pizza and sandwiches). Check! Our fourth step was to fly to Dublin. Check! Our fifth step was to get four exhausted through the Dublin airport in less than an hour. Check! Our sixth step was to fly to Barcelona. Check! Our seventh step was to get ourselves and all our crap through immigration. Check! Our eighth step was to get all our crap into a taxi (it all fit hooray!!). Check! WE HAD FINALLY ARRIVED!!