The rest of the flight was unremarkable and we arrived in the city late Thursday night, exhausted and wondering what there was to do here. By the time our luggage came we had decided, and a little while later we were in our brand new Mustang rental, heading south on I-10 through the darkness of night, driving the hundred or so miles to our last-minute, escape-the-Phoenix-sprawl destination: we were headed to Tucson.

We spent the next day at the Kitt Peak Observatory--where Greg had spent a few months during his undergrad years--walking about the freezing mountain top and tiptoeing past the dorms of sleeping researchers, the curious domed tops of the giant telescopes dotting the landscape like some strange otherworldly outpost. I had called Homer that morning to let him know we were in town, and after some time watching the animals at the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum we headed over to pick him up for a quick drive-through of the city and what would turn out to a be a most delicious dinner.

There's really something about the desert that invigorates me. The dry southwest air, the strange dusty mountains, the ocotillo with their fiery red tips and the prickly saguaro standing there across the countryside, Greg and I constantly on the lookout for the quintessential two-armed Snoopy-shaped ones. Perhaps it's the call of open blue sky that rejuvenates me so. Standing in the open desert and watching the endless road go on for miles and miles, I felt as far away from New York City as I could possibly be, and it was something I certainly welcomed. Perhaps, like I said, it's the open blue sky. Perhaps it's the cool desert heat. Perhaps, and maybe just perhaps, it's a state of mind, a drunkenly deliciously at-peace state of mind I felt yesterday, one delightful day spent in the great outdoors, walking and walking and walking under the Tucson sun.

Photos soon here.

[permalink] ::

I am sitting in 12D, watching Greg as he turns the pages of his paperback, the white noise roar of the engines drowning out the cabin quiet and murmuring into my ear the hum of a useless nothingness. We're on our second leg of our flight to Phoenix. We switched seats in Nashville, Greg now at the window and I the aisle, an empty seat and tiny blue polyester blanket between. I pick up the blanket and examine the tag. Flight Luxe, it reads.

There was a time I loved the window seat. As a kid, I loved peering out as we took off down the runway, watching in wonderment the trees as they rushed by and the tiny houses in the distance, tinier and tinier and tinier yet as we climbed. I would fight my brother the infrequent times we'd be on an airplane to be able to press my nose against the transparent rectangles, to be closer to the action, visual proof of where we were and part and parcel of a trip abroad. My brother, the smart one, he would allot half the window time to me, the time when darkness had already fallen and he had had his fill. I was not one to complain, too naive to understand the power of bargaining and too junior to commandeer authority. I would eagerly take whatever I could get, and I was content with my darkness.

Our stopover a few hours ago in Nashville was a short and uneventful one. It gave us just enough time to stretch our legs and make a quick phone call before we were off again, chasing the sun west and forcing it to rise once more as we climbed into the sky. It is here I sit now, thirty thousand feet somewhere over Albuquerque, writing this entry. I take a look around. Across the aisle in 11C, an elderly man with orange suspenders and sensible orthopedics reads a sullied copy of the New York Times. He's been reading it since we left. I watched him unbuckle his seatbelt as we taxied onto the runway and the moment the stewards were out of sight, defiant and obstinate to their heeding. In my mind he is a farmer, a forceful and no-nonsense farmer, stubborn to all except his wife who sat in the seat next to him and who would have made him fasten his belt had she seen him unbuckle it. A few rows ahead in 7D through F, a trio of gay thirtysomethings watches in synchronized rapture a movie playing on their portable player. They chortle together as the tiny screen flickers, and the one nearest the aisle orders another drink, two plastic cups already in front of him, red stirrers with tips in the shape of hearts in each. They are headed to Las Vegas.

It's been a while since I've felt the childhood excitement of a flight, having flown enough times since then and growing sufficiently cynical in my years. Instead of a seat near a window, I now ask for one near the aisle, favouring the practicality of additional legroom over the lure of a view. Instead of looking out as we taxi to the runway, I doze off in boredom. I've become jaded with the things that once thrilled me, careless of the novelty that once was there. But every once in a while it surprises me. Every once in a while like tonight, when I lean over Greg, now sleeping against the little blue blanket, like tonight when I peer out the window to the tiny sliver of blue on the darkened horizon, every once in a while I catch myself and take a great big breath and say to myself, Wow, this is what it's like to be young again.

[permalink] ::

Spring this year has been volatile for me. Some days warm, some days cold, some days like yesterday, all dark and cloudy and thunderstormy wet. My mind has been in somewhat of a fog, my mood and spirits up and down and fickle like changes in the weather. I took the day off from work yesterday, a mental health day, and spent my waking hours staring out at the skies and the heavy rains that poured and stopped and then poured again. The second round of rains caught me by surprise, and I stood a few minutes under an awning with several rush-hour commuters, all of us either without umbrellas or not trusting them and our delicate shoes against the torrential downpours.

The pigeons outside our bedroom window seem to not mind the rains. They've come back to nest for a second year despite being under open skies, perhaps having grown accustomed to our generosity with seed. The season's first set of chicks, a pair of shy and quiet twins, have already begun flying, and I discovered a fresh pair of newly laid eggs yesterday when I checked in on the little family. It's only a matter of time before the eggs hatch and the parents give the final push off to the twins.

I woke this morning in the same haze that has become wretchedly familiar to me, disturbed by a night listless with strange and potent dreams, and went through my morning routine in dreamlike syrupy slow motion. It's been like this for a while. But then, on my walk to the trains and just as suddenly as yesterday's rains had come, I felt an unannounced and inexplicable sense of happiness, a strange sensation of levity that has been eluding me these past few months, a lifting of some sort of burden so to speak. Perhaps it was the thought of an upcoming Arizona trip for a family wedding, perhaps it was the warm, gentle morning sunshine dancing on my face, perhaps it was the cherry blossoms outside my apartment window that seemed to have overnight exploded into a most brilliant and spectacular canopy of colour above me.

And though I knew the feeling was temporary, though I knew the sensation fleeting, I was thankful for whatever it was and smiled quietly to myself. I smiled quietly and hugged myself and kept on walking, walking, walking as fast as I could, walking and hugging and smiling because sometimes when these moods hit you, it's really just about all you can do to keep yourself from sinking. You know?

[permalink] ::