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Doing 80 down the highway with the open road in front of you is an unmatched feeling. I prefer to drive alone on a road trip that lasts over three hours long, but that’s just me. If you’re smart, you took Friday off from work, meaning that you either got on the road late Thursday night after getting out of the office or woke up early Friday morning. I’m a huge fan of the early Friday morning drive but again, that’s just personal preference.
And in that moment, as you’re hurtling down the highway jamming to Springsteen or some DMB deep cuts, life is genuinely good.
The out of office e-mail is on, you’ve got a five-dollar latte from Starbucks chilling in the center console, and you know that the weekend ahead is going to be fun. Maybe you’ve got a wedding, perhaps you’re just going home to chill and catch up with the parents – whatever it is you’re doing, it’s a hell of a lot better than being at work on Friday and you’ve taken this time off for a specific reason.
And while it’s great on the drive there, I’d argue that there are few things in life that are worse than the return trip. And now, if you’ll allow me, I’d like to go into an extremely Barack Obama voice for these next few words. Let me be clear – this is not a commentary on the Sunday Scaries.
For me, the anxiety that goes along with that return trip nearly always cripples me come Saturday afternoon, as I’m sipping a cold beer with close friends or family members or getting ready to board a bus from the chapel to the reception hall. No matter how hard I try, I am unable to get the nagging, intrusive thought out of my head that I’m going to have to get back in my car and drive back home in a little less than 24 hours.
It’s enough to make me think about cutting myself off from drinking for the rest of the day – not enough to *actually* stop drinking, but the return trip gives me pause. And while it’s really easy for everyone reading this to say “Just don’t think about it” in regards to the return trip, it is something else entirely to actually do that. There are three stages to this issue, and I’ll tell you up front that it doesn’t end well.
1. Denial
You’re not going to let on right away that the return trip is even a thing. The drive home the next day is going to be dominating your thoughts, but you’re going to carry on outwardly as if everything is fine. You’re still trying to be in the moment, but with each passing hour that gets harder and harder to do. You’re not quite at the point where you’re setting an alarm for the next day on your phone, but the thought of the return trip grows larger with each break in speeches from the groomsmen/bridesmaids or commercial interruption in college football action.
2. Drink about it.
You’ll go up to the open bar at the wedding reception and ask for a double or ask your dad to break out the nice bottle of scotch in the liquor cabinet. Staving off negative thoughts is easier with a head full of liquor and you think that maybe, just maybe, you can drown out the voices in your head with the hard stuff.
3. Acceptance
The vacation is over. Friday night was fun and all and even early Saturday morning was great. But those return trip demons are now at the forefront of your brain, and now you’re basically on a countdown clock. You’ve set an alarm for the next morning, you looked at The Weather Channel app to see if you’re going to have to drive through a rain or snow storm, and there’s just no chance of having any more fun the rest of the evening. .
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jduda@grandex.co
I’m a big believer in hitting the road as soon as possible the final day of the trip, so nothing is more frustrating than sharing a hotel room/house/car or whatever with people who just want to lay in bed or lounge about as long as possible
This is the main reason I always offer to drive. Everyone else can feel free to sleep in the car, but I have places to be.
To combat this epidemic, we have instituted ‘Sunday Rules’
We set a time to leave, usually very early, say 7am. If you are not in the lobby of the hotel or by the car at 7am, we leave. Granted, we will try to call or bang on your hotel room door, but if you decide to shack up the night before or sleep through your alarm, then you are on your own. The rationale being that you are a full grown adult and we are not your babysitters. I can tell you, we have only ever had to leave 2 people behind in the past 7 years since we started this.
Or just make sure to stash PTO to use for Mondays, makes Sunday return trip anxiety a thing of the past
Work lets me remote one day a week. It’s great on normal weeks, but on those Sunday return weekends it is a blessing.
That’s easier said than done. But if my company didn’t count PTO, this is definitely the move
Can we expect some TFOFC installments soon?
Took Friday AND Monday off and made the return trip Monday morning. Monday was rainy so I watched the Cubs, binged Netflix, and got little things done around the apartment. I highly recommend it.
I dread the 7 hour drive home, but the return trip is the absolute worst. Not to mention losing an hour coming back east + driving through ATL. This put me in my feelings about having to take a trip home in a couple of weeks.
A seven hour drive means I’m flying. Can’t be convinced of anything else.
Don’t forget about flying back return trips..
When I visit the parents for the weekend, I try to get in a Sunday dinner with them before I leave. It’s about a three hour drive which isn’t great or terrible, but two of my mom’s dinners makes it feel like I had two whole days off, rather than a day and a half (and gives me the old-times feels from when I lived at home), but man, it makes the drive back pretty bleak. That final “whelp, I probably should get going” is horrible.