We collapse over the threshold in an exhausted heap. The luggage, which was organized and packed neatly a week ago, is now jammed with odd pieces in every suitcase orifice.

Of course, it is late in the day, as all vacations begin early out the door--excitement encouraging an early departure--and end with an after-hours return. Although the house is clean (I hate leaving a mess) the air is still stale and dormant from the lack of children’s squeals to delight it for the last week. We trip over the pile of newspapers and mail, and the counter becomes littered with emptying pocket vacation remnant souvenirs: receipts wrapped around change, a melted Star-lite mint, a gumball machine toy clothed in lint…We forage without appetite or discretion for any remaining sustenance that didn’t get tossed or should be now. Gratefully and without protest, we all climb into our own beds which haven’t forgotten our forms as the familiar mattress feels like a cradle. The odd sleeping combinations of the past weeks on the road dissolve, and we all fit back to where we started.

We sleep deeply; with the kind of exhaustion that is the side effect of days spent in the water, sun, and the embrace of family. When I wake up too early this dreaded day after, it is to the most heinous chore on earth--unpacking. Nothing seems to fit where it did mere days ago, either that, or the post-vacation lethargy makes it impossible to fit the puzzle pieces of tenuous organization together again. Laundry seems obvious, so I dress in whatever remaining wrinkled discards of the drawer, hoping these long-neglected items at least don’t clash with my sunburn lines that appeared after a particularly long, languid, lazy river float as our family tree bloomed into a daisy chain linked together during our family reunion weekend.

My kids sleep in, and I am glad as I sip my coffee made just the way I like it and from the ceramic Christmas mug rather than the hotel Styrofoam. I’ll think about the delicious breakfast I ate yesterday outside with my nieces and nephews, each pulling up a chair as they stumbled downstairs to an-ever growing table with an-ever growing flustered waiter. And as each stained shirt goes into the wash, I’ll have a moment of recall of how it got there. Baby Diva discovering raspberries are her new favorite food, chocolate ice cream dribbles that seemed to begin and end each day for son number 2…

Baby Diva’s stroller is stuffed with stuffed animals. There are gifts from her grandparents; peace treaties from her parents. My oldest has grown another 2 inches at least, leaving amusement park height requirements a thing of the past. He teams off with his cousins now; no longer clinging to the safety of my legs or his Dad’s shoulders. He orders off of the adult menu. The two little ones have bronzed into the color of the glazed top of crème brulee with only a swim diaper line. At times these last few weeks I have scarcely kept track of how many children I do have--my 3 have been amassed into a sibling’s family, at other times I have an extra one or two or four.

We have played the token games of a family reunion, but also the subtle ones, like "Whose Your Favorite Aunt?" tease, or "How many people can you stuff in a Tahoe or Disney boat?" I have heard several different versions of the same story with dramatic twists at the end. We have recalled the punch lines of old inside jokes and wrote new ones under a palm tree. My eyes have been wet from pool splashing, but misted even more when my father-in law made a patriarchal toast at dinner which assembled his 6 children and 15 grandchildren. We have spent a fortune on the priceless.

My husband returns to work a little early on this day after--I know from his incessant Blackberry ringing that vacations cost him more than me--and we probably won’t talk again until well after dinner when he calls to tell me he’ll be late catching up. A million little life details have come up during the day which require his input or counsel (should I call someone about the dishwasher not working or is he out of shaving cream?) but when he asks, "What's new?" I’ll answer the ironical, "Not much."

But the little life detail most on my mind is that my favorite chore on my least favorite day is cleaning daisy chain petals from our pockets.

© 2006 Tracey Henry