"What do you mean you're not in the back seat??"

I've talked before about how much I love/adore/miss my family. Even though they are a wonderful bunch of people, they are not - of course - without their faults. For example, my mother obviously has some sort of forgetfulness issues. (Either that or she just doesn't like certain members of our family.) (This picture of her riding the grocery cart through the Kroger parking lot isn't relevant, I just think its funny.)

For my first piece of evidence, the People submit Article A: The Rest Stop Incident of 1993

Back story: Every summer, our family took a trip to Florida. Even though my father's favorite beach (always went to the same beach, stayed in the same hotel ["7th floor oceanfront, please."] and ate at the same restaurants...that was his style) was a good 800 miles from our little Nashville home, we did not fly. Oh no, each July we packed up the giant conversion van (also, much to the embarrassment of my sister and I, his style) and set out on the trip. Now my dad really loved the beach. He loved it so much that he could not wait to get there. This meant that we made as few stops are humanly possible. Our meals came from drive-thru windows and if we had to go to the bathroom we had to beg him to stop at a rest stop and then rush, rush, rush to get back to the van.

Onto the story of The Rest Stop Incident of 1993: When I was eight and my sister was four we made our annual pilgrimage to Florida. However, it was on that trip that the first hint of my mom's "forgetfulness" emmerged. We were stopped at a rest stop so that my mom, my sister and myself could use the restroom. When I had finished, I hurried back to the van so that I could claim the coveted back seat bench (the source of so many fights between my sister and I during our childhood). I laid down, put in the headphones of my cassette player (to listen to either Wynonna Judd or Ace of Base, I'm sure...wow I had such good taste) and closed my eyes. A few minutes later we pulled back onto the interstate, in search of our destination. And then - all of a sudden - my mom started screaming (PS: my mom does not handle scary or high stress situations well. Not at all.). I removed my headphones and opened my eyes to discover that my sister was not in the van. My dad - who also did not handle high stress situations well - began yelling as he frantically looked for a place to turn around, which is often difficult on the interstate. Sparing you all of the details - my sister was fine but - as she will tell you - emotionally scarred.

For my next piece of evidence, I'd like to submit The Rest Stop Incident of 1996: Our roadtrips always took us through Atlanta, which is a heavily congested area at all times of the day. If you remember, the 1996 Summer Olympics took place in Atlanta, further contributing to the craziness. My parents had the bright idea that we would travel in the middle of the night as we were heading home from Florida and hopefully would avoid as much traffic as possible. Several hours into the trip, my mother pulls into a rest stop. My sister, dad and I are sleeping but my dad wakes up to ask her what she is doing. She says that she is going to the bathroom - duh (do people say that anymore...? Well, I do.). After she leaves the van, he decides that he does in fact have to go to the bathroom. While he is gone to the bathroom, she returns. Not knowing he had gone left the van, she pulls out of the parking lot. You're probably thinking, "Oh my goodness, another incident of having to search for a place to turn around on the interstate?" Ha, I wish that had been what happened. Actually, my mother didn't realize he was gone until three hours had passed. Three hours. Not knowing what to do (as this was in the days before we had cell phones), my dad called the police right after he discovered she had left. They picked him up, fed him and gave him a place to sit and wait. When she realized he was missing, she also called the police....and then we drove back to get him. And by the time we finally got to Atlanta, it was the middle of the day. And we had to sit in ridiculous traffic. It was the longest and most unenjoyable ride of my life.

And finally there was the McDonald's Incident of 2009: A couple weeks ago when my mom, sister and grandmother were on the way to Ohio for my cousin's wedding, they stopped at a McDonalds. My sister went into the restroom only to come out to discover that - you guessed it - my mom had left her. Luckily, thanks to the technology of cell phones, this was a quicker fix than the last time.

When my sister called to tell me about this, I seriously didn't believe it. How does someone leave their child, leave their husband and then leave their (adult) child? The moral of the story is: if you ever go anywhere with my mother do not - I repeat, do not, use the bathroom.