VICARIOUS ADVENTURES

The Bittersweet Experience of Dropping a Beloved Kid at the Airport with a One-Way Ticket

I now understand my dad’s 1989 Gatwick Airport face

As our 22-year-old daughter prepares to head off on a year-long backpacking trip to Australia, I’m now starting to understand what my parents must have gone through when my sister Jackie and I did the same all those years ago.

I’ll never forget looking back as we headed through the gates at Gatwick Airport and seeing my dad’s face crumple. Ever the pessimist, I’m sure he’d convinced himself he would never see the two of us again.

In those days, we didn’t have cell phones or easy internet connections. Our family expected to receive our news via letters and postcards.

If we wanted to speak with our parents, we’d have to find a phone box and stuff coins in the slot, one after another, until we ran out. In an emergency or if we were broke, we’d make an expensive reverse charge call.

We relied on paper maps and our Lonely Planet, Australia on a Shoestring book to figure out where to go, how to get there and where to stay. Fingers crossed, our copy wasn’t too out of date.

What if the fantastic backpacker’s hostel on page 52 that other travellers had raved about — was full or worse — no longer existed? What if we arrived in a new place on a Sunday or statutory holiday with no cash and the banks were closed?

What if we couldn’t find a place to cash traveller’s cheques, lost our passports or our packs got stolen? What if —

Even though I travelled thousands of miles by bus and train with a backpack in my twenties, the thought of my daughter doing the same scares me more than a little.

I shudder at the memory of a few near misses due to lack of experience and judgement, poor decisions made under the influence of alcohol and being too trusting. I used up a few lives and was lucky enough to survive to tell the tales to my kids — well, some of them, anyway.

So now the circle of life moves on, and it’s my daughter’s turn to spread her wings and fly off to explore the world. How can this once tiny, helpless baby have become a strong, taller-than-me, confident, independent person?

Since graduating from university earlier this year, our daughter has worked hard to pay for her plane ticket and other travel expenses. She applied for a working visa and thoroughly researched the areas she plans to visit. She’s recorded it all on a travel spreadsheet!

We’d never heard of spreadsheets in the early 80s. I penned my travel plans and musings in mini spiral-bound notebooks and made notes in the margins of my Lonely Planet guide.

As a parent, it’s hard to get it right — the balance between helping too much or too little. I’ve been avoiding making suggestions or giving unrequested advice.

I want to support my daughter in a way that won’t take away her power. But I realize she hasn’t needed my help. She is confident and organized and seems to have it all figured out — well, almost.

Last-minute thoughts included booking a dental check andfiguring out phone plans. But our intrepid traveller took care of all the big stuff months ago.

I’m so damn proud of her!

Thoughts of our daughter travelling bring bittersweet feelings. On the one hand, we’ve encouraged her to be adventurous and learn from the great university of life, believing travel experiences can shape a person at least as much as a formal education.

On the other hand, we worry about the things that could go wrong and all the ways she could be hurt — everything from unsavoury characters lurking in alleyways to crocodile attacks to Redback spider poisonings, snake bites, white water rafting and scuba diving incidents.

I have to remind myself constantly that most things we worry about never happen, and the chances are she’ll have a fantastic trip and return home safely.

If anything terrible should occur, we could be on the next plane and be with her in a few hours, and if she runs out of money, we can transfer some to her in minutes.

And what about the decisions she might make at the end of her year-long working holiday in Australia? I try to keep a neutral expression when she says she may continue travelling in Asia afterward or wonders aloud if she’ll make Australia her home.

In the olden days, when children emigrated to other countries, parents would stand at the dock with tear-streaked faces as they said their goodbyes. They’d wave white handkerchiefs across the waves as their loved ones departed by ship for far-flung lands — never to be seen again.

Things are very different now.

We love our daughter so much and will miss her terribly, but at least we’ll be able to message her in multiple ways and see her smiley face on the phone. We can look forward to four-way family chats and enjoy hearing about her escapades.

I’m sure my husband and I will be surreptitiously swiping tears as we say our goodbyes at the airport. I want to be brave and see our kiddo off with a big, bright smile and a cheery wave as she walks through the gate, but I’m not sure I’ll be able to suppress a small sob.

I hope our daughter will feel the oceans of love we’ll be wafting her way as she embarks on this amazing adventure of a lifetime! 💗

Gill McCulloch, October 14, 2023