I just had to get it all out on the table.  No way around it.  Tell the truth.  And, own it.  All of the good bad and ugly.  (Notice the zombie glare coming from our unhappy and cold one. We had all had just about enough of that day.)

It is not all glory. The photos we post, the stories we are relating and the parts of your imaginations we have inspired are the facts as we have seen them to be.  It is our story.  Not necessarily exactly perfect “truth”, or the complete reality.  But, our truth.  The pieces we have processed and the moments of time we will carry with us for days ahead.

We might look to be well pulled together.  Happy.  Thoughtful. And, absolutely delighted.  Every single day.  As we post family pictures on Facebook and Instagram, you might think we have it all together.

The truth is, we are a family of 4 with dynamics that could peel the paint right off the ship.  We are 4 nearly adult size people who are sharing around 400 square meters of space.  One of us is 8 and finding his voice and power.  Especially, his voice about how much power his older brother will be allowed.  One is 11 who collects data from every source possible and consistently relates it to us as we make so many data “mistakes”. (We replace some of the data with experiences, in order for him to better “see”.) One is 43 who is simply grateful to be going around the world, away from the daily food preparation, laundry, and hustle and bustle of each and every minute.  I deal with the daily details of pulling 4 of us in the same direction, managing bank accounts without reliable internet, and try to make sense of a life with so much less “work”.  The last and most traveled of all of us is nearly 50!  He has been around the block and can help us to interpret many things we are seeing.  He watches us, tries to keep us safe and troubleshoots on the fly.  And, carries the shortest traveler when he is “done”, along with our 50 lbs of personal items. Our hero.  He really does know so very, very much.

Keep in mind,  all of our personal privacy has been removed, and our spaces away from one another are all occupied by up to the 800 other people we share our common space with. Personal privacy has been replaced with other voyagers from around the planet who have amazing stories to tell and life experiences to share.  Learning happens every day, even when you are not open to it.  Learning is everywhere. And, it can be exhausting.  Just give me my simple life, known life, back for 5 minutes.  Really, that might be all I need.

Traveling is serious business.  Traveling on a ship at sea is an additional layer of complication.  We are on this ship until we allowed off by whichever country we are begging to allow us access.  We are grateful when they allow us access no matter what our newest president has done or said in the past 48 hours.  (This is a real fear.  Maybe, we are no longer welcome.  Maybe, we will not be allowed back home.)  Our ports of call could change at any minute dependent upon the whims or unrest of the country we would like to learn more about. It takes 2 days to simply acclimate to the country we have landed in.  We do not know how it works.  This takes time.

So, it might look really good from the moments we show.  But, there are moments, minutes, and days where we are truly being challenged.

Food in other countries is an adventure every single time you order.  You have no idea what they have brought you, or whether you hopes and desires have been “heard” by the person on the other side of your order.  Me, having a shellfish allergy, requires a particular type of reliance upon the kindness of the waitperson to understand my best attempts at explaining “no shellfish”.  Watching us order is like watching a long game of charades while the house is burning down around us.  Pointing, gesturing, and hoping someone somewhere close by knows what this nutty group is trying to convey.  Bread!  We beg for bread. Cheese, please.  I dream of cheese.  In countries that do not have regular (and cheap) sources of refrigeration, cheese is only a dream.  It is not in Southern Asia.  An impossibility.

We are so very grateful for the kindness shown to us by the wait staff in the countries we have been to.  We have met so many “helper” people.  Many attempts have been made to locate an English speaker for us. (We really are astonished by how many people know a little bit).  And, we are very aware we have zero language skills except for those we use every single day.  We are a failed 2^nd language family.  No way around it.  (Tate is currently working with a college student from Japan every day.  He is learning Japanese.  There may be hope for us as a group!) I do find myself breaking into my Mexico tourist Spanish.  A broken language I have picked up from being in different countries.  By no means would it really work in the real big world.  It is messy.  And, not based on facts.

There have been so many botched meals. Especially by our pickiest travel eater person.  It is heartbreaking to order a cheese pizza and receive something like pizza with peas, carrots, and random bits of mystery meat.  We suggest it is not to be eaten. He watches us try and seems to be learning some sort of flexibility.  Or, it could be disappointment and lowered standards.  Either way, he has yet to go starving except for the day in China he refused to eat anything. (Honestly, I did the same.  I relied on coke bottle candies and water.)   He drank Orange Fanta by the bucket.   If you get what you order it is a banner event.  We cheer.  We celebrate plain.

Bread.  Bread is generally safe.  It works to fill that belly. Just eat bread and FRITOS……Fritos seem to be everywhere.  Who knew?  They are a global snack!  Pringles seem to be easily shipped and offered to us clearly “western” looking folk at every local market.  It is astonishing.  I suspect none of the locals eat these, they just offer it to us.  A kind gesture of “See, we know what you like.”

We have walked away from melting down members of the family in all sorts of town squares.  We have had yelling matches in each country we have visited.  There have been long periods of silent treatments.  And, threats of shutting down shipboard credit account. I do not think I have yet thrown anything out of anger, but it is bound to happen.  Throwing a soft dinner roll may be coming soon.  One just does not know.  We make up new rules on the fly.  Most of the time they are just crazy and we know it the minute it comes off of our parental lips.  All I can say is we are trying.  I guess we should get some video of these nonsense moments to review at a different time.

Some days, I have been known to “close the cabin”.  I just announce the cabin is closed.  Get out.  The power.  Mind you, the longest I have managed to close the cabin is 45 minutes.  Whoop!

We are just like your family would be attempting to get around in a new country.  Messy!  Trying to find something to eat….and speaking an extraordinary amount of time in one another’s physical space…..and having no clue what our next move might be.

We have returned from adult social hours to find that a Lord of the Flies contest has gone down in our absence.  I have found children that do not belong to us inhabiting our cabin, and our own children are nowhere to be seen. We have lost our own kids to college students rooms.  These boys are running their own fabulous shows.

There have been evenings we have returned to the furniture being rearranged during some sort of a strength contest.  The beating of the apelike chests has ended, but we not find mattresses shoved into the bathroom.  (One night, we found Lincoln had physically moved his twin bed into the bathroom.  It was wedged diagonally between the throne and the bathtub.)  The kid has passion, and really showed his brother what he could do.  Extraordinary strength.  Of course, no one can sleep on a mattress that is sitting at a 45 degree angle wedged between a toilet and a tub.  But, we congratulated him for taking things into his own hands.  Passionate and strong.

One needs to know we are marching forward as any of the rest of you would.  We are grateful, challenged and astonished every single day.  We are sweaty, dirty, and unclear of so many daily activities.  We do not know what day it is, or how to property say “thank you” in the language that is appropriate. We would not trade any of it for all the money in the world…but remember…..It is never as good as it looks.  Not perfect.  We are a group of clowns, of varying ages and abilities.

I can say that we now have a silent language that has developed all on its own.  It is clear when someone just needs to be left alone to deal with whatever is happening to them.  They will come back to our motley group in time.  After another Fanta, or one more tube of Pringles.   One cannot travel entirely in a bubble.  We need each other to keep moving forward.

So, there is the truth. Our rough edges show.  Every single day.  We are traveling!!  We know this will be the story of our family for years.  No way around it.