There was a time when shouting out "Road Trip!" was one of the most joyous things you could do. It usually meant packing up with your friends, a case of beer, box of wine, and cheap camping foods. The world is wide-open before you, pure freedom and joy, celebrating youth and truck-stops and peeing in the woods. Then, something happens in the aging process and it becomes a marriage/partnership thing, and instead of being about flying down the highway blasting music and laughing at stupid jokes, it becomes a treacherous back-and-forth of driving commands and audible sighs.
I figured out the secret though - I just drove eight of the most beautiful hours (minus the Midland-Odessa part, but that's another story for the Environment section) with my husband. Once we got out of the DFW area, I haven't experienced a road trip like this that wasn't by myself - I'll let y'all in on it.
Here is what you do - the night before you leave, tell him this: "Honey, since we have to leave SO early in the morning, and you like staying up late playing video games anyway, why don't you just stay up all night? Then you can help me wake up early and I'll just drive the whole way while you sleep!"
It works. Except for an occasional waking moment of "What?! What are you doing?", there was nothing except me, Blind Melon, wind farms, cotton fields, road signs telling me how much further I had to go, and a sleeping man. No degrading comments about women drivers, no shouting-back-at-him with "I swear I'll never drive anywhere with you again! You suck!"
Okay, so maybe I did have to wake him up to help me remember how to get down the oh-so-confusing country roads to his parents' house, but by that time, he couldn't pound the "me man, me drive good" at me anymore. It feels good to love the man after a long trip, again.
HA great idea thx