When we renovated our house two years ago, we moved out to Marin, 2 tunnels and 1 bridge away. But nearly every day, we drove back into the city: to check on things at the house, to take Ben to preschool, to visit with friends. Ben loved all the driving–he learned to identify every make and model of car on the road; but Eli was just a little bug at the time and didn’t (to put it mildly) much like spending time in the car. The one thing he liked, though, was those two tunnels: one (this is so very Northern California) painted with rainbow stripes on the outside; one unpainted, but longer, and with lights inside. He loved the sudden darkness and then the sudden (to him) whoosh back out into the light. We got into the habit of counting down “3-2-1 tunnnnnnnelll!” as we entered each tunnel, and then yelling out a dramatic “O-o-out of the tunnel!” as we drove out. It cracked him up, and hollering like fools is a small price to pay for family harmony on the road. We still do it. And today, as we drove home from a visit to a friend in Marin, Eli clapped as we drove out of the tunnel and I thought, whew, we are out of the tunnel. Ben’s back in school, Eli seems not to have gotten the bug, Tony and I are both back on our feet. Let’s hope it lasts!