Dearest Rachel –
This letter is probably going to have to be brief, because we’re headed out the door for the airport. For all that I would wish that travel would be relatively easy – and compared to the past, it rather is (expense aside) – there’s a reason the word comes down to us from the Latin word for ‘work.’ Trying to get everything together (and keep it together) while making it through every checkpoint ahead of time so as to board the flight on time… well, I guess I can see why you were no fan of flying.
It’s still weird to think that I wasn’t aware of this fact until our very last trip together, when we took the train down to see your ‘Aunt’ Ruth in San Antonio, followed by a side trip to New Orleans before the world closed down on us all. You never said anything about it (that I can recall) when we made our way to wherever it was that we were catching our various cruise ships. Then again, it might explain just a little bit more why you were disappointed in getting a cruise for our 25th anniversary as opposed to another week on the island, where we could drive to rather than fly.
Of course, there were places we wanted to go to that rather required flying to get to; anything that involved crossing an ocean rather precludes vehicular or rail transport, such as taking Daniel to see Japan, for instance. Once again, that may have been as much a question of expense and time as travel method that interfered with our ever doing so. You seemed to be keen on the idea of going back there and showing him the places you had seen and been, so you would have put up with the necessity, just as you had to the various places our family as a whole began cruising from, once Dad’s business began to, erm, take off (pardon the pun). To you, flying was a necessary evil when it came to transit; not your preferred method of getting from point A to point B, but one that could be endured, especially when there were no other feasible options.
Meanwhile, here Daniel and I are, about to hop our third flight out of town this year – and that doesn’t include the two trips to Honduras I took without him. I’ve been flying almost every other month.
And I wonder to myself; how would you have felt about this lifestyle?
As much as it feels like very little has changed from 2021 to now, at least on a day-to-day level, the fact is that things are so much different from when you were around. From cleaning out the collections of stuff you hung onto (since you knew that if you let go of any of it, the day would come that you would need it), to the remodeling work done in the kitchen and the laundry room (but no further), to the many travels we’ve taken since the quarantine was finally lifted (even though both of us are currently in the process of shaking off our individual colds), I wonder how much of the life we live would be recognizable to you, were you to suddenly drop in on us.
Especially right now, as we sit in the airport, waiting for another flight.
I’d set my alarm for five in the morning, thinking we would need to get out by six to catch a nine o’clock flight. You know, the standard dad logic regarding punctuality. My body saw all that, and raised me by a half-hour, giving me that much more time to pull myself together.
And as it turned out, we needed it; our flight may have been with United, but for some reason, it was docking at Gate G4, in terminal three, rather than in terminal one, where we’d checked ourselves in. The walk was long, but not as interminable as I’d feared; we arrived at the gate with about a half hour to spare. For all I know, it’s the same half hour early that I woke up with.
So this is where we are, honey, waiting to get aboard and head out. It’s probably one of the biggest nuisances about getting from one place to another, but it’s not something we wouldn’t have to deal with in a railway station or a bus terminal, either. I’m not sure what your thing was about flying, and I guess I’ll never really know at this point. All I know is that you bore up with it until you got the chance to not have to, and that’s when I found out otherwise.
But thanks for putting up with my literal flights of fancy through now.
