Growing up, my family lived in Europe for several years. Every weekend, or so it seemed at the time, my parents loaded Little Siblings and I into our Volvo and we went set off to a castle or cathedral or something else eight-year-olds don’t care about. My childhood memories are littered with the refrain, “Not another stupid castle! I don’t want to see another stupid castle!” Last weekend, a friend and I braved the tourists and went down to the Cherry Blossom Festival on Kite Day or whatever it’s officially called. As I was walking through the Tidal Basin, I overhead a little girl say, “Not another stupid Cherry Blossom.” Parts of my childhood flashed before me: Little Sister’s never ending car sickness, sampling Schnitzel at every restaurant in Germany, fighting in the back seat of the car because Little Brother’s arm was in “my sector.” Suddenly, I wasn’t annoyed with the masses of tourists who can’t figure out a Metro card. They were a million different variations of my family, making memories on a lazy Saturday afternoon. And the best part: none of them had a Barf Bucket.
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