In my late 20s, I spent several days crammed in a van with my parents and three (adult) siblings driving halfway across Canada – from BC to Manitoba – for my grandmother’s memorial service. When I tell you this is the type of experience I wish for my son, you’ll think, “That’s it. This chick is definitely crazy.”

I’d say you have to understand my family to get it, but you don’t. We’re like any number of other families out there – we drive each other crazy at times. Sometimes we’re in touch a lot and other times I can’t remember when I last saw my brother. We compare ourselves and find fun and comfort in our similarities. We contrast ourselves and joke that our youngest sister is adopted. We are there for each other – always, unfailingly, without question.

So when all the logistical hurdles have been tackled and it turns out the most logical – and least frighteningly expensive – option for getting us all to the service is to drive there, in a van, together, none of us balks. It will be nothing less than an adventure.

Picture a van with miles and miles to go on the Trans-Canada. Each of us likes to be prepared for any eventuality (we get it from our mother) and this means none of us packs light. The van is crammed. Full of people, full of bags, full of cameras and things to do and music to listen to. And somewhere, beneath all of the people and all of their stuff, is an urn.

This suddenly occurs to me.

“Mom, where’s Grandma?”

“Under the seat.”

Silence.

I knew she had to be with us. She has to get there somehow. But I didn’t actually stop to think about the implications. I have a brief, “Oh my God. Mom!!” moment but it quickly passes. Of course she’s with us. It couldn’t be otherwise. I do briefly wonder if Grandma thinks we’re all crazy but realize she knows us well enough to know. We totally are. And I know she’s glad this is how this trip has turned out to be.

We drive.

We’re six people who are very similar and very different all at the same time, and between swim meets and family trips we’ve spent a lot of time in vehicles together. I know how this could go. I know how it would have gone in the past. I cross my fingers no one asks my middle sister where she wants to eat. (Kidding, Michelle! I know we’re long past the days where we’d all choose somewhere and you wouldn’t want to go and would have a fit about it.) (She’s going to kill me for this.)

We drive.

We were smart enough to get a van with a DVD player, so we watch movies.

We drive.

When movies get boring, we turn on the music. We have very, ahem, different tastes in music, and that same middle sister usually wins for having taste that’s agreeable to most of us. So we pop in her disc of tunes.

We drive.

We’ve left BC behind. We’ve left Alberta behind. We’re long past the ocean, which all of us love. We can no longer see the towering Rockies, to which all of us return repeatedly because there’s something there that draws us back. (Two of us live there now, and I won’t be at all surprised if we all end up back there again.) We’re now in Saskatchewan. It’s pretty, but flat. Nothing but miles and miles of highway in front of us.

The music plays and we drive on.

None of us is particularly shy about singing along, and over the last couple of days there have been various voices joining in for a chorus here, a verse there.

One track ends, and another begins. And suddenly we’re all belting out the same song.

“Movin’ right along in search of good times and good news,
With good friends, you can’t lose,
This could become a habit.”

The Muppets. Does anyone else have a family who would have a Muppets song on a road trip mix? This is totally normal for my family. And it’s totally normal that we’d all be singing along.

“Movin’ right along,
Foot-loose and fancy free.
Getting there is half the fun; come share it with me.”

Driving and singing. There’s nothing really that stands out about this, except that this is how my family is and I’m grateful for it. Then comes the moment.

“Movin’ right along.
Hey LA, where’ve you gone?
Send someone to fetch us, we’re in Saskatchewan!”

Peals of laughter. My mom is laughing so hard she’s crying. Of course my magical sister would have this song on her mix. Of course we’d hear this song, this line, while we’re driving along the highway in Saskatchewan. All six (seven?) of us, in a place none of us has visited often – some of us never before and never since. A place we’ve never all been together.

“Movin’ right along.
We’re truly birds of a feather,
We’re in this together and we know where we’re going.”

I want this for my son. I want him to have a family he can laugh with and cry with and drive a thousand miles with. I want him to have shared experiences that pop up at just the right moment, that make him laugh and cry at the same time, and that define his family in ways it’s hard for outsiders to understand. I want him – no matter the circumstance – to know that we’re in this together and we know where we’re going.

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This is another post in response to The Red Dress Club’s memoir prompts. This week’s assignment was to choose a memory, recall it in detail and then investigate what this memory means. I had a hard time choosing a memory and when I first started working with this one I wasn’t sure where it was going. But of course the meaning was there all along.

Post dedicated to my awesome family, which includes my husband who, while he wasn’t there for this, fits right in to the craziness. Birds of a feather, indeed.