Steve Christilaw: There’s nothing like a road trip

There’s something mythical about riding a bus.

It’s one of the things that crosses your mind while you’re in a passenger van with a load of family driving across seven states. A 30-hour drive, each way, can be a numbing experience. For mind and backside.

That long in a car with the younger generation is, in a word, an experience.

For one, it gives them ample opportunity to criticize your musical choices.

“Grandpa, uh, do you think you could you play something from THIS century?”

“No.”

Grandma is so cheeky sometimes.

Word to the wise – be careful where you stop for a meal. Kansas City barbecue is fantastic, but if you still have eight hours left in the drive, I recommend sticking with the cole slaw and corn bread.

Avoid the baked beans at all costs. I think the last 60 miles of our trip violated the Geneva Conventions.

As you cross states with wide expanses between outposts, you spend a good deal of time without the Internet, and that can be both a good and bad thing. For one, it prevents the grandkids from accessing the game menu on their devices, but it also leaves you thankfully free from the latest proclamation from the local college football coach who loves to stoke controversy.

And it prevents you from suffering through a Seattle Mariners losing streak that drops them out of first place in the American League West. Thankfully, the relatives from Houston, wearing World Champion Astros T-shirts, happily remind you.

For the most part, while you’re stuck in that car seat, the mind wanders while the body cannot.

For one, it recalls all those times coaches have raved to you about how a good trip on a school bus can bring a team together in ways nothing else can.

Funny, but you don’t realize how magical it is when it’s you sitting on one of those bench seats with a backpack filled with class work sitting on your lap while a joker in the back steals your cap for a game of keep-away.

Having been a frequent benchwarmer on a variety of school teams, I can say with a fair amount of authority that it’s a different experience for a team than for the kids riding to and from school.

But it’s difficult to put your finger on just what makes it different.

Perhaps it’s the camaraderie that comes with playing a team sport. If there is so much as a seed of it anywhere on the roster, a lengthy bus ride is the fertile bed in which it will grow and blossom.

It’s not something you find climbing on a Central Valley bus for the trip to Gonzaga Prep, or on the ride from Ferris to Lewis and Clark. Not nearly far enough, even when you get stopped by every stoplight along the way.

It takes something longer.

The minimum distance varies, but coaches at West and East Valley feel that the drive to Cheney isn’t quite far enough and the ride to Pullman and Clarkston works. Still better, they suggest, a road game in Wenatchee or the Tri-Cities is better. A trip across the pass is better still. An overnighter is optimal.

The bus ride is the price you pay to be a professional athlete.

Ask a young hockey player about bus rides. Mention Moose Jaw to a few and you see their eyes glaze over and they begin to talk about how they’ve learned to sleep sitting up. On more than one occasion I’ve had the occasional defenseman instinctively massage his backside at the mention of a road trip through Saskatchewan.

After the second 30-hour excursion in a week, I understand intimately where that reaction comes from – and I empathize now in ways I never did at the time.

What I know is this: time spent together, no matter what it is that you are doing (or not doing) is an investment in relationships.

Whether it’s your teammates or your family, it’s the kind of experience that brings you all together.

Whether it’s a weekend series with the Camas Papermakers or your significant other’s parents celebrating their 60th wedding anniversary with a family reunion in the Ozarks.

My working theory is that it isn’t any one thing for any particular group.

Instead, it’s the collected stories, and the experiences that make them so special.

It’s the kid who fell asleep in a seat and woke up in the overhead storage. Or the card games in the back row. Or the time the bus was pulled over for speeding through the back roads of Northern Idaho en route to a wrestling match and the coach spent the time kicking dirt on the state patrolman’s shoes.

It’s basking in the afterglow of a doubleheader sweep of an archrival, or the shared commiseration of a tough loss on the opening weekend of the season.

It’s magic.

For me? It’s taking a granddaughter for a root beer float made with frozen custard instead of ice cream. Or watching another granddaughter close her eyes and sing along with the soundtrack from “Hamilton.” Or having your grandson fall asleep in your lap and try to fluff your shoulder.

It’s spending time with the daughter you adopted when she joined the family and feeling your appreciation for her grow with each passing mile.

That’s why you get on the bus. Or get in the van.

It’s an experience that takes you farther than wheels can ever go.