Traveling Blog
I started writing this blog in the dingy, overcrowded lounge at O’Hare airport, laptop balanced on its lumpy case. My flight was delayed. I had an enormous wet blotch on my silk blazer from the restaurant ice cube I rubbed on it earlier (after I dribbled chile con queso all over myself). I was washed out and bleary eyed.
The Chicago work trip I was sent on was an exercise in endurance. I worked from noon to nearly 11 Friday (after getting up at 4 to pack and catch my flight), and from 5 until 4 Saturday, helping speakers run through their slides and setting up their presentations, fielding questions from bewildered travelers. My room was cushy (but I barely saw it). The Aaah- I’m re-energizing sign from the door handle was nothing more than a wish (of course I took the sign home; it now hangs on our bathroom door with a glimmer of hope for a long bath).
After I made it to the airport, my wonder at the fascinating stream of multicolored, multisized, multilingual masses was truncated by my hasty choice of seat at Chiles, facing a lone and lonely male diner in checkered shirt. I had to stare into my tostadas to avoid his too eager gaze. I was glad when he left.
I was tired and cranky, and now chile stained, but a remote corner of my tired brain and body looked forward to my time alone in a strange place. A visit to the airport-ubiquitous Hudson News woke me up a bit. I drooled over magazines before finally choosing Harper’s and The New Yorker. Further up, Hudson Books provided more enticing choices. An Eric Carle book for Gavin, a Thich Nhat Hanh book for Tom, and Anne Lamott’s Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith for me. What joy, to walk through the airport with (gulp) $50 worth of promising new reads! I had to chuckle at the endorsements on Thich Nhat Hanh’s book. When the Dalai Lama, Martin Luther King, Jr, and Thomas Merton all have nothing but praise, I guess you could say those are pretty good endorsements! No Dalai Lama for Anne Lamott, but I see she is working her way there. (The New York Times and the LA Times are the worldly equivalent).
The Book god smiled on me, and that would have been enough. But then a new god, the First Class god, also lit my way home. I was commiserating with my fellow delayed passengers about the exodus from H18 to K18, the continual posting of later and later departure times, and incoherent announcements over a fuzzy loudspeaker when, simultaneously, we marooned strangers voiced one breathy, relieved word: finally. They were starting to board at long last, calling out passengers by zone. Like a lottery winner I had to verify what I was reading on my ticket, and leaned over to my neighbor. Does this First mean First Class? Yes it does, channeled the First Class god through a middle-aged woman.
I am still not sure how or why I was seated there, but I was a first class virgin about to be decoached. And everything they say is true. It really is better up there, and not just by a small margin! The flight attendant was amused by my innocence (later, he crooned How was your first time?), and treated me especially nicely (you’re not supposed to tip up there, are you?). I am not sure whether it was the freshly roasted (still warm) nuts, the hot towel for my face and hands, the focaccia, the tortellini, the wine, the dessert I had no room for, or the leg room that sold me the most. But, boy, coach is going to be hard to take next time.
It is late Sunday now, and I have been home since late last night. This blog got added to over several states, at my dining room table in Connecticut, and finally from the bathroom as I watched Gavin soak in his bath.
Last week I had the joys of travel with family, and so much of the joy was about our companionship, our family-ness. Our little family does and enjoys things that we know are unique to us: the kitschy Catskill hotel, the Israeli food in Woodstock, an uphill hike at the Overlook trail. What is best about both my family of origin and my own little family of three is that we all genuinely enjoy each others’ company (well, at least most of the time!). And that is a gift: I know many families who avoid each others’ company.
My travel time alone is all about being alone. I choose what I want when I want it. I linger too long at places where, if I was accompanied, I would surely be dragged away. I watch others drift by and tuck away secret thoughts about their lives, their reasons for travel, their distant destinations. Both kinds of travel enrich me. And in another way, both kinds exhaust me. As Dorothy said, even after Oz, even after meeting three very good new friends, There’s no place like home.
The Chicago work trip I was sent on was an exercise in endurance. I worked from noon to nearly 11 Friday (after getting up at 4 to pack and catch my flight), and from 5 until 4 Saturday, helping speakers run through their slides and setting up their presentations, fielding questions from bewildered travelers. My room was cushy (but I barely saw it). The Aaah- I’m re-energizing sign from the door handle was nothing more than a wish (of course I took the sign home; it now hangs on our bathroom door with a glimmer of hope for a long bath).
After I made it to the airport, my wonder at the fascinating stream of multicolored, multisized, multilingual masses was truncated by my hasty choice of seat at Chiles, facing a lone and lonely male diner in checkered shirt. I had to stare into my tostadas to avoid his too eager gaze. I was glad when he left.
I was tired and cranky, and now chile stained, but a remote corner of my tired brain and body looked forward to my time alone in a strange place. A visit to the airport-ubiquitous Hudson News woke me up a bit. I drooled over magazines before finally choosing Harper’s and The New Yorker. Further up, Hudson Books provided more enticing choices. An Eric Carle book for Gavin, a Thich Nhat Hanh book for Tom, and Anne Lamott’s Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith for me. What joy, to walk through the airport with (gulp) $50 worth of promising new reads! I had to chuckle at the endorsements on Thich Nhat Hanh’s book. When the Dalai Lama, Martin Luther King, Jr, and Thomas Merton all have nothing but praise, I guess you could say those are pretty good endorsements! No Dalai Lama for Anne Lamott, but I see she is working her way there. (The New York Times and the LA Times are the worldly equivalent).
The Book god smiled on me, and that would have been enough. But then a new god, the First Class god, also lit my way home. I was commiserating with my fellow delayed passengers about the exodus from H18 to K18, the continual posting of later and later departure times, and incoherent announcements over a fuzzy loudspeaker when, simultaneously, we marooned strangers voiced one breathy, relieved word: finally. They were starting to board at long last, calling out passengers by zone. Like a lottery winner I had to verify what I was reading on my ticket, and leaned over to my neighbor. Does this First mean First Class? Yes it does, channeled the First Class god through a middle-aged woman.
I am still not sure how or why I was seated there, but I was a first class virgin about to be decoached. And everything they say is true. It really is better up there, and not just by a small margin! The flight attendant was amused by my innocence (later, he crooned How was your first time?), and treated me especially nicely (you’re not supposed to tip up there, are you?). I am not sure whether it was the freshly roasted (still warm) nuts, the hot towel for my face and hands, the focaccia, the tortellini, the wine, the dessert I had no room for, or the leg room that sold me the most. But, boy, coach is going to be hard to take next time.
It is late Sunday now, and I have been home since late last night. This blog got added to over several states, at my dining room table in Connecticut, and finally from the bathroom as I watched Gavin soak in his bath.
Last week I had the joys of travel with family, and so much of the joy was about our companionship, our family-ness. Our little family does and enjoys things that we know are unique to us: the kitschy Catskill hotel, the Israeli food in Woodstock, an uphill hike at the Overlook trail. What is best about both my family of origin and my own little family of three is that we all genuinely enjoy each others’ company (well, at least most of the time!). And that is a gift: I know many families who avoid each others’ company.
My travel time alone is all about being alone. I choose what I want when I want it. I linger too long at places where, if I was accompanied, I would surely be dragged away. I watch others drift by and tuck away secret thoughts about their lives, their reasons for travel, their distant destinations. Both kinds of travel enrich me. And in another way, both kinds exhaust me. As Dorothy said, even after Oz, even after meeting three very good new friends, There’s no place like home.
posted by Katherine H | 2:48 AM
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