One padded cell, please. Hold the straight jacket…


I have just realized what hell must be like…It is over-stimulation of all the senses at once. I have just returned from a frightfully fast 6-day whirlwind trip to The Big Apple with 176 other people (the majority of which were 18-15 years old). And I must say I had a ball. There is nothing like chaperoning a bunch of teenagers to make you feel alive. We saw all the sights. The Empire State Building, Ellis Island, Liberty Island, Ground Zero, St Patrick’s Cathedral, St Paul’s Church, Grand Central Station, Little Italy. Chinatown, Central Park, the financial district, shopping on 5th Avenue. We went to Lincoln Center to hear the New York Philharmonic. We saw the Lion King on Broadway. It was GREAT. I loved it!

However…

The 18 hour bus ride back home just about sent me over the edge. The vibration of the bus, the bright sun and chrome, the deafening sound of the 14th action-packed thriller DVD plugged into the bus’ sound system, and the feel of my derriere widening as I sat and sat and sat, sent me into sensory overload. We were an hour away from home and I was begging for a solid white padded room with an extensive sound barrier system. I tried to sleep. I tried ear plugs. I tried ear phones with sounds of my own choosing. No good. Will Smith’s Independence Day and Tobey Maguire’s Spider Man won the contest for custody of my hearing, while the Gray Line Bus won ownership of my vestibular system.

Don’t get me wrong. The kids were OK. There were no particularly rowdy individuals. No obnoxious behavior…but the bus trip was a little like being on a ride at Universal Studios in a bad B rated horror flick, where the ride just went on and on and on. And you can’t get off…You have to scream to be heard and you just know that someone is going to die in the end.

I know I’m being a wimp, but I think I will fly to the next destination and meet the bus of unchaperoned kids….Hey they are all “plugged into” something anyway. Teenagers these days are either texting, listening to their I-pods, playing their gaming-utensil-of- choice or watching TV. They are completely entertained and if they are entertained, they are usually staying out of trouble. So maybe I’ll just save myself some trouble….

Save me a seat on Southwest!!!!