Rejuvenating… and Expensive
We recently returned from Parents Weekend (aka Family Weekend) at the University of Colorado, Boulder (“Sko Buffs”) where we visited our eldest daughter, Hannah. In a few weeks, we’ll be jetting off to Norman, Oklahoma for Parents Weekend at the University of Oklahoma (“Boomer Sooner”). Parents Weekend is the ideal time for my baby momma and I to visit our girls in their natural collegiate habitat; to rejuvenate the family bond and to confirm that they’re both still enrolled. Parents Weekend is heartwarming, fun, chaotic, eye opening, expensive and exhausting, especially for the freshman parents going through it for the first time.
This was our third Parents Weekend at CU and it will be our second at OU. I’m impressed with the schools that realize freshman and sophomores, and to some degree even upper classmen, need a little family loving 5-7 weeks into the fall semester. It’s also a great opportunity to sell a lot of school merch and swag. Typical Parents Weekends are action-packed, with planned activities on or around campus (tours, tailgates and a home football game). Then there’s the family activities off campus, usually involving a credit card (shopping, lunch, shopping, dinner, shopping, housekeeping/cleaning and more shopping). Our credit cards are as tired as we are after these whirlwind weekends.
Planning for Parents Weekend starts with booking flights. Unless you’re lucky enough to have your kids attend one of the many California colleges or universities, all within driving distance, Southwest will likely get you virtually anywhere else, on time and in one piece, for a price. Flying isn’t cheap unless you’re willing to take a few scheduling and safety risks on some of the economy airlines, (rhymes with Fearit and Brontier).
Once you secure travel, it’s time to book your accommodations. Unless I’m mistaken, every hotel, motel, plaza and inn located anywhere near a college or university highlights the four times a year to really jack up the room rates. Those would logically be move-in weekend, move-out weekend, Homecoming weekend and Parents Weekend. A word to the wise: unless you book a room close to a year in advance, you’ll likely be staying in the next city, county or state.
The last part of your Parents Weekend travel plans involves renting a car. Most rent-a-car companies aren’t locked into the same “gouge the college parent consumer” chat room as the hotels, but it’s just one more expense. Just for the record, we like Alamo.
Once Mom and Dad (siblings are optional) arrive somewhere near campus (dorm, student housing, fraternity/sorority house or off-campus residence) on Friday, the first order of business is a meal. Most of our kids are so sick of their normal food options they are dying for a good meal—one that they don’t have to pay for or Super Size. That’s usually followed by a trip to CVS, Safeway, Costco, Walmart and/or Sam’s Club. Kids need stuff. Stuff includes groceries, toiletries, clothes, school supplies, accessories, coffee, cleaning supplies and knick-knacks. Individually, nothing is tremendously pricey, but collectively it all easily add up to a week’s worth of wages or more.
Shopping is followed by a visit to your child’s living pod where you immediately realize that despite how clean and tidy the family home is kept, most college kids live in filth and squalor. Apparently, not one of our sweet, loveable, capable, manageable, knowledgeable spawn can keep a clean room. It must be a right of passage, but as parents, a lot of us can’t help but break out into “clean-mode.” It’s not like we’re going to break out the fire hose and five-gallon drum of Scrubbing Bubbles, but we’re going to sweep, vacuum or wipe before the toxic mold spreads.
Friday night concludes with a casual dinner followed by coffee or dessert. It’s really nice if you run into some of your kid’s new friends and can ask a series of canned and rehearsed questions. 1. Where are you from? 2. How did you two meet? 3. What are you studying? 4. Do you like your roommates? 4. Are these your parents or probation officers? Then it’s time to get back to the hotel to rest up for game day—that is, unless your child attends a football-less institution, in which case I don’t know what you would do on Saturday. Flea market, craft fair or sports bar perhaps?
Parents Weekend has been an amazing experience for me! I have two students at the same school and I really look forward to Parents Weekend each year. It gives me the chance to see my kids in their own environment, interacting with their friends. I can share in the fun of watching competitive football, and socialize with other student’s parents at various tailgate parties. The college years are going by way too fast. Parents Weekend has given me the opportunity to share a part of my kid’s life journey with them. – Cara V.
Saturday is all about the game, along with the pregame and postgame activities. My girls like to tailgate. Fraternity tailgates are a $h*t Show. Cheap warm beer, ear-splitting loud music and disgusting bathrooms are all part of the charming ambiance leading up to kick-off. Sadly, fraternities apparently don’t have a budget for hotdogs. Few sporting events are as much fun as college football games. Marching bands, cheerleaders, mascots, alumni, home field advantage and school spirit are part of the sensory overload. The game is the game, but it’s always fun just being there for an average price of $90 per ticket.
Post game is usually code for “let’s go out to a nice dinner this time.” Following a pricey meal, the kiddies are likely going to float from party to party on a Saturday night which means they’ll dismiss us back to our hotel at a reasonable hour. Fortunately, most hotel bars are filled with parents, still wearing their bookstore purchased apparel, stopping for a nightcap. This is a nice time to network and commiserate.
Sunday starts with breakfast or brunch… somewhere. At CU it’s the sorority and at OU it’s one of the 273 Jimmy’s Egg restaurants in the state of Oklahoma. This is the weekend wrap-up before parents head home via highway or byway, aka airports. We tell the kids to study hard, get plenty of rest, take care of themselves and have fun, but not too much fun. “If you can’t be good, be careful “is my signature Dad line. There are usually a few tears (mostly mine) as we say our goodbyes, but knowing that they’ll be home soon enough for Thanksgiving is our saving grace.
Truth be told, Parents Weekend is the perfect opportunity to recharge the parent and child emotional batteries and at the end of the weekend we couldn’t care less how much it costs. That’s what Home Equity loans are for, right?
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