CLT airport. huge busy crazy. counted 3 starbucks, got my fix at the first one. love this craziness, the confusion, the chaos, the people-watching.
pass by currency exchange booths, slowing down to gaze at the list of international rates...costa rica, dominican republic...ahh, how i wish wish wish i could exchange my u.s. cash for some foreign money, then hop on a plane to someplace exotic.
traveling alone is so fun, the possibilities are endless. i know my real life has responsibilities & people to care for, but it’s just fun to imagine...what if...what if i decided to trade in my ticket & go anyplace in the world i wanted? where would i go? what people would i meet? what if i ended up in a place where i didn’t know the language, it smelled funny & i forgot my sunscreen? one can only imagine.
traveling alone is so fun, the possibilities are endless. i know my real life has responsibilities & people to care for, but it’s just fun to imagine...what if...what if i decided to trade in my ticket & go anyplace in the world i wanted? where would i go? what people would i meet? what if i ended up in a place where i didn’t know the language, it smelled funny & i forgot my sunscreen? one can only imagine.
time to decide what complimentary beverage i want from the us airways flight crew. oh the possibilities. cranberry apple juice or fuze tea? back to reality.
no exotic rain forests or turquoise waters to look down upon from this window, just neat & tidy plots of land between ribbons of highway, lots of lakes, peeking out from swirling masses of clouds..moving northward to the landlocked midwest. where’s that drink cart?
sitting in minneapolis airport. this place has a slower vibe, older & more run-down, thinner crowds than the CLT airport, but the lay-out is more confusing. Multiple floors and terminals and wings all connected by a tram, this back-and-forth rail system that takes you from one place that makes no sense to another illogically-placed location that looks exactly like the place you just left. In other words, i’ve just spent the past 50 minutes getting lost and more lost and back to just lost again. bought a ridiculously-priced turkey & cheddar sandwich & am now waiting again, this time for the shuttle van that will take me the 90-mile drive across the state line and to Eau Claire, WI. And obviously i am so bored that i have to narrate my entire life here.
Good ol’ Midwestern folk sit in plastic chairs scattered around me, absently staring at their phones or into outer space. In 40 minutes i’ll get on a van with these people and ride away from the big city and through the vast countrysides and picturesque farm settings of America’s Dairyland. Even after all these years, those familiar roads still bring back memories of a very different journey than I’m now on. A simple, slow road of growing up and experiencing life at a slower pace, from the viewpoint of a fairly naive child & teenager. Things were simpler back then, but i’m not going to get into how things were back in the olden days.
What’s more startling to me now, is how a seemingly lack of drama in my life back then was really just a cover-up for the striving, tumultuous emotions I hid inside, not wanting my very non-emotional family to tease me for being such a drama queen, as if that were even a “thing” back then. Now i see things differently, and i could easily pick apart my family’s dysfunctions as they become so black-and-white to me when I see them again, but what for? This is a time to just enjoy who they are, for I may not have many more days, hours, minutes, left in this lifetime to spend with those who raised me.
p.s. just for the record...
here's my wcw: (woman crush wednesday)
i know it's a bit weird but..
it's my mom:
grew up on a farm,
taught high school p.e. & biology,
raised 5 gnarly kids,
takes good care of her ill husband,
loves her 2 grandkids & multiple grand-cats, dogs, chickens, pigs, & goats.
It's good to see her again.
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