Aren't you thankful for airport hotspots? I just refuse to shut up.
Before I go, I leave you with one word. Heart. Not peace or happiness, those come and go. But the human reality remains constant through all the changes. So, find your wings. If your heart says so, don't resist. Even if the career change is not the right step, even if that move you plan away from your town is not sensible, even if it rains and you still want to go for a walk. Even if you want to drive to a meeting that you dont want to go. Because the heart is seldom wrong. Is calling seventy people to convince them to attend a conference more fun than a gin and tonic in a wood-paneled bar?
I slantedly look at the oldish Spanish holiday-makers with much-varied baggage as they sit around chatting among themselves. There is always an Indian girl, with hurried serious expression, that sits on a chair with a book. Some things never change.
What do I want? I don't know. Some days are perfect, and I just don't want them to end. I want them to stretch to infinity. Like Groundhog Day! Today is not one of those days, nor was yesterday. And Saturday I could live again all over without provoking others into anger.
I am looking forward to coming back. And I say that with some terpidation. Jean Jenet said (and I am paraphrasing from memory), "You smoke a cigarette and feel joy. Then you smoke a second cigarette because you seek the joy. But the feeling is different and you feel disappointed." I still have half a pack of unsmoked cigarettes in my bag somewhere. But each cigarette is a possibility (even for a non-smoker like me. Substitute it with your choice forbidden pleasure - nice bourbon whiskey perhaps) and I am always open to possibilities. May be on Saturday, I will walk all the way to Cafe Brazil and watch insufferable Portugese music videos.
I quote partially from Wislawa Szymborska's "Possibilities" before I go.
"I prefer many things that I haven't mentioned here
to many things I've also left unsaid.
I prefer zeroes on the loose
to those lined up behind a cipher.
I prefer the time of insects to the time of stars.
I prefer to knock on wood.
I prefer not to ask how much longer and when.
I prefer keeping in mind even the possibility
that existence has its own reason for being."
Perhaps all the poetry left in me is about the insides of airplanes. Their tidy blue cushined seats, familar head rests, narrow walkways, emergency lighting. Apparently, we are led to believe that a a fall of fifty thousand feet head down in a fireball will still save your life if you keep your head between your legs in a brace position. Just as well, may be it will break the neck in a clean, nice way. May be I will rediscover poetry mid-flight. OK got to go. It is always important to think macabre thoughts before a flight.
As Garrison Keeler would sign off, Take care of yourself, and each other.
