10 Things Not to do When Traveling with a Toddler.

Originally featured on Elephant Journal December 18, 2018

Not long ago, my husband, toddler, and I dropped everything to fly around the world for a family emergency.

First and foremost, toddlers are little bundles of entropy, with sweetly redeeming giggles and grins. And they can be little demons in squishy fluid-oozing bodies. They make for exciting traveling companions.

We previously considered—and ultimately decided against—the same leisurely trip to visit family, because: toddlers. The variability of toddler moods on a good day can be crazy tempestuous, not to mention while traveling. Since we were forced to make the 48 hour journey from Alaska to Ireland anyway, we learned a few enlightening lessons along the way.

My husband and I have done a lot of international traveling. He’s originally from Ireland and I’m from Alaska. We met in India seven years ago and before baby came, we covered a fair portion of the world and racked up the airline miles to prove it.

But parenting and traveling? It’s newish territory for us.

Mostly, everyone we met while crammed into tin cans in the sky were sweet and accommodating. Traveling internationally tests all of us, especially those of us who are parents.

I once sat next to a mother on a nine hour flight with an infant who cried for approximately eight hours and 45 mins of the journey. Another passenger kept coming up to our row of seats and offering to take the mother’s little one to give her a moment of respite and each time, the mother politely declined. Finally, after hours of this, the other passenger came up, grabbed the baby from the mother’s arms and walked away down the aisle. The baby stopped crying immediately and all the passengers around us let out a collective sigh. The mother put her face into her hands and…

Read the full article here.

Minnie Driver says it All in this Tweet about the Irish Abortion Referendum.

lizzie_dennis89/Instagram

Originally featured on Elephant Journal May 26, 2018

Yesterday, the Republic of Ireland held a popular vote on the Eighth Amendment to the Irish constitution.

The “8th” as many refer to it, is an amendment to the Irish constitution that passed in 1983 and effectively outlaws abortion on the island. Thousands of Irish women (and families) have been forced to travel to the United Kingdom every year for private and essential reproductive health care.

Because of the Eighth Amendment, Ireland did not allow for abortions in the cases of rape, incest, or fatal fetal abnormalities, and only nominally allowed for abortions (read: not consistently or practically) in the case of the health of the mother. See the tragic, irresponsible, and unnecessary death of Savita Halappanavar as an example of the iron grip the Eighth Amendment held on a doctor’s ability to grant life-saving health care…

Read the full article here.

The Unexpected American who Stole the Show at the Royal Wedding.

BBC

Originally featured on Elephant Journal May 19, 2018

Editor’s Note: SPOILER alert. If you haven’t yet watched the royal wedding, be warned. Spoilers below.

I didn’t expect to be watching the royal wedding today.

I’m currently sitting in Belfast, Northern Ireland suffering a week’s worth of jet lag. My very Irish husband and sleep-deprived toddler happened to be napping, so I thought, Why not?

In case you’ve been living under a rock for the past few weeks, today, American actress Meghan Markle married British Prince Harry at Windsor Castle in London.

Pomp and circumstance don’t normally catch my attention. I was on a remote beach in India when Prince William married Kate Middleton—happily oblivious to life outside of early-morning diving, warm flaky samosas, and sipping scalding chai under salty mangroves.

Read the full article here.