Okay, here goes —

With seven children in tow, Doug, Beall, and a dear family friend board Continental Flight 1, bound for distant shores. Before us lay many, many hours and many, many miles in close airborne quarters.

But before we will traverse even one of these miles, we must first make it through what we affectionately call “the long march down the corridor.” This is where we usually get pummeled with “Are they all yours?,” “Better you than me,” “Are you Mormons?” and various offers to provide Beall and me with certain “helpful” medical information.

Today, we march Von Trapp style (oldest to youngest), each child with a rolling backpack in tow. My family is divided into groups. My group includes three of my four sons, two of whom are directly across the aisle.

We are finally all settled and down the aisle comes a woman. She is thin, looks to be in her early fifties, and is dark of skin, with unusual, but distinctive facial features. The woman sits down next to me.

She takes one look at my son Providence and says with a thick accent and husky voice: “Hi little baby”(then, turning to me) “I love babies. Children are wonderful. Very important to have children.”

“I love children too,” says I, “God has given me seven. They are all on the plane today.”

“That’s nothing,” says the woman, “I am a great-grandmother of nine.”

“Surely not,” I exclaim with sincerity. “How can you be old enough to be a great grandmother?”

“Oh, I am plenty old. I am an old woman. I am fifty-seven.”

“Ma’am, fifty-seven is not old, and it is certainly not old enough to be a great grandmother of nine?is it?”

“Well I have thirty-eight grandchildren.”

“You have thirty-eight grandchildren! That is fantastic! That is wonderful! You are so blessed. Do you mind if I ask how many children you had?”

“I had fourteen children.”

“F-o-u-r-t-e-e-n C-h-i-l-d-r-e-n! That is wonderful. What a blessing!”

“Oh, yes, they are a blessing. You should have more children. Seven is a good start, but it is time to get serious.”

“That would be a blessing,” I say while smiling (secretly doing all that I can to repress the urge to dance down the aisle).

Gaining my composure I query: “Ma’am, may I ask how many brothers and sisters you had?”

“My mother and father had twenty-two children.”

“Surely not! Not twenty-two? Did they really have twenty-two? Well, how many grandchildren did they have?”

“My father lived to 84 and had 82 grandchildren.”

At this point I am bug-eyed.

Thus begins an extensive interview of this dear woman who I learn is from Guam, of the Chamorro tribe, still married to her first husband (whom she wed at age sixteen), that she has a great relationship with each of her grandchildren and great-grandchildren, and that she spends much of her time traveling to the homes of her vast progeny to help with grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Her only complaint was that when she visits those that live in the United States, she has to suffer eating American food which she finds intolerable.

The hours go by. Our plane arrives.

Through a seeming miracle of God, and to the utter astonishment of passengers, crew (and myself), my children have been quiet and well behaved throughout the multi-hour flight. Even the baby.

A passenger near me very politely says: “Wow, your children were really good.” (Translation: “We were ready to run for our lives when we realized that a bunch of kids would be on the plane with us for so many hours.”)

He continues: “It looked so easy.”

“Please, please don’t be fooled,” say I. Traveling with children is like a ballet. You do your best to make it look smooth and easy so as not to be a distraction to others. But the fact is that you are balancing your body on one toe and contorting your remaining appendages into bizarre positions — all this while smiling. It’s the same principle when traveling with a large family. It requires much effort, but the end result is great joy and satisfaction. And some days are better than others. You caught us on a good day. But the key difference between us and most ballerinas is that we don’t kid ourselves about our puny abilities or that success is the result of some exercise formula — it is only God’s grace and His mercy. God was so kind to us on this trip.

Postscript:

Our return flight was less harmonious. Not long after take-off, dear Providence threw-up repeatedly over everyone and everything (or at least it seemed that way at the time). The result was a shock wave of gasps, disgusted looks and panic throughout our sector of the plane. Wild-eyed flight attendants grabbed — I am not kidding about this — an enormous bright red containment bag with “infectious disease” stamped on it in black lettering. One male flight attendant observed the women flight attendants helping mop-up the mess, grabbed his nose and his stomach and said “I’m gonna throw-up” and ran off gasping and holding his nose. The process was so horrible as to be downright humorous. When all was said and done, one nicely manicured, but completely repulsed flight attendant brought the enormous containment bag of soiled clothing and dirty cleanup rags to Beall and announced “Since your baby got sick, you are going to have to keep this on your seat for the rest of the trip. We do not have space for it anywhere else.” To which Beall laughed and responded: “Is this my punishment to remind me not to let this to happen again?” No response from the flight attendant.