Relocations

 

Departures, arrivals, despairs and elations

The bold wiggly lines show my journeys in the past ... 

(July 16th and 17th) 

Call me crazy but my preferred arrival time for a scheduled departure is about three hours early. A coffee, a thought, an ascent into stillness.

All these in preparation for cattle handling. Coats off, shoes off (if they’re Naughty Shoes), digital frisking …

Mooo.

Baleful stare; no further resistance permitted.

Levered into a shoebox. Ignore neighbour. No “Hi,” no smile, no “nice day for it.”  

Existential aloneness at three centimetres.

No I don’t want a bloody cookie. They used to be called biscuits in my country before American colonization.

Okay. Recolonization. My lot colonized too.

(And is there a relationship between colonization and colon? Back door? Hmm. Much time for thinking, levered into a shoe box of silence).

Ah … but the rare joys of a good hotel. Turns out I had a $40 credit with the pre-paid booking. A fine risotto and good Cab Sav and oh such welcome sleep.

Briefly.

Until cattle-handling begins again, inexplicably late because, apparently, this flying cattle wagon was delayed by fog.

Invisible fog.

Fog that affected no other departing flight. Including the rival airline. They took off from the neighbouring holding pen ten minutes earlier, bound for the same destination.

Selective fog, then?

But mercifully peaceful once prodded and levered into place. No cookies. An omelette of some sort to ease the boredom, screens of other folks’ entertainment (“Atonement,” anyone? “The Room Next Door”?)

( Note to self … watch these when homeward bound).

I nestle myself into a cocoon of Spotify and suddenly I’m there, ejected, (bags untouched because I look so honest?). Out into the maelstrom of arrivals and departures and tears and fears, memories and expectations.

And no connection with the waiting world.

Because? Because tinpot SIM provider provides only an epic fail.

I tap on the icon of the provider, only to receive notification that I can’t connect because I am not connected. So begins a moebius loop of meaninglessness.

Airport coffee and a howl of existential pain in an unmoved universe.

But I am there (here) on the Big Red Western Isle.