Go On, Get It
Flights, the passing of time (what even is that?) and lettin it rip
Boyyyyy howdy we took a pretty big break there, didn’t we?
Shame on me for not knowing until this year, my 36th year in life, that Thanksgiving doesn’t have a set day like Xmas or Easter does; it is simply just the last Thursday of November, like a holiday-themed improv show or a running group. Everything felt a little off leading up to it, as if time was wrong and poking me softly in the ribs. I chalked it up to celebrating a birthday the same weeks as the election, grief, and a period that felt like a never-ending prank.
CC: The psychic who told me to get my hormones checked “soon…. yah, soon”.
And now, I am smack dab in the middle of a semi-existential crisis about what time means. What does time mean??????
Christmas has come and gone. Today, I am in Bend, OR, and tomorrow, I will board another plane in Redmond, which will connect to another plane in Salt Lake City, which will then take me home to Chicago. Then it’ll be New Year’s Eve. Then, it will be 2025. And then and then and then.
AND THEN?
If it feels like I was just in an airport, it’s because I was and have been for much of this year—more than I’d like, to be honest.
Last month, I was flying to Florida to spend Thanksgiving with my dad, sipping a mediocre mimosa that I felt a sticky shame about ordering. This wasn’t a vacation; what was I celebrating? What do I call this? How do I categorize this behavior? The tingly numbness at the edge of my peripheral didn’t feel nice. It made me feel more disconnected than I already was. I didn’t finish the sugary mimosa, leaving half a can of orange juice concentrate to rattle on my table until the flight attendant picked it up with lingering eye contact that made me smile in defense of “I’m fine!”.
Before the flight, I ate a Thai chicken salad wrap the size of a premie at Wolf Gang Puck Express while sitting next to a family that was obviously fighting. While I signed my check at the bar, I listened in on a loud and talkative man who, from behind, looked like 2009 Ryan Cabrera but, from the side, just looked like a ghost who had been cursed to wander Terminal C of the Ohare airport. He was asking the bartender, a woman, why she moved from Arizona to Chicago. He was trying to flirt and she was barely letting him, a dance I’m sure she knows well.
“Arizona sucked,” she said while pouring two blue moons, eliciting an alarming laugh from Haunted Ryan Cabrera that made the fighting family behind me suddenly pause. I watched the hazy golden ale slosh over the glasses and onto the bartender's hands, and I pushed down the urge to order another for myself. I had drank half of one while housing my 10-pound wrap earlier, bringing it up to the bar because I was too full on cabbage, questionable airport chicken, and hops to finish it. But now, with the threat of a flight to a place that holds more anxiety than sunshine, I suddenly had the urge to say a big fuck it and chug 32 more ounces simply because I could. I bit my lip, checking my phone to see how much time I had before my flight boarded. 7 minutes. Oof. What other times have I chugged an airport beer 7 minutes before my flight has taken off? I looked at my reflection on the black phone screen and felt off kilter in any reality to make a healthy decision for myself. I hate this airport, I hate this terminal, I hate-
“Arizona!” the man bellowed next to me, finishing his Jack and Coke. “NO THANKS”.
I thought about sharing my own Arizona experience, perhaps offering my take on how the majority of the air BNBs in Scottsdale look like places where porn is filmed. And then my mind jumped to the 22-year-old hairless male dancers who came to Laura’s bachelorette party two years ago to “play sexy bachelorette games” (hot dogs tied to strings tied around our waists, violently swinging left and right as we try to get them into solo cups) and entertain us with “horny dancing” (80% shaking, 20% coy eye contact). Side note: it was 2 PM. Pretty quickly, we were in the kitchen with them, shoveling Sun Chips into our mouths, wiping our dusty fingers on our dry bikinis, and listening to them tell us about going to the gym a lot to “get the body right for fame.” It was a gorgeous moment. They were great guys. Up until 6 months ago, I followed one of them on Instagram. I hope he’s well. I hope he’s happy. I hope he’s fam-
FLIGHT TO TAMPA NOW BOARDING. PLEASE HAVE YOUR BOARDING PASS AND IDENTIFICATION READY.
My 7 minutes were up. How quickly time flies when you’re disassociating in the airport.
The flight back from Florida was very different. I was not pretending to celebrate anything. I wanted to text Brice and decompress our trip, but I know that to do that, we both needed a little time and space to let the memory of the trip drop into our bodies in a way that felt translatable. I also knew that Brice may not need to decompress like I did and that he also may not need that with me, at least not now. Maybe not ever.
This is something that would make me feel sickly alone and wildly uncomfortable at the beginning of all of this when my dad was freshly diagnosed, and Lexapro was not yet foxtrotting its way through my veins. Grief left a hole too confusing and too big to fill, and I caught myself teetering on the edge, perpetually catching my balance. This is an unfortunate place to be. It can make you feel like all your feelings are someone else’s fault, which they are not, barely ever, especially in grief. And even if they are, for a moment, they can’t be forever.
I landed, took a cab home, let Jeff cover my face in licks, and started to unpack my suitcase (an unheard-of task for me). Right as I was putting clothes into the washer, Brice called.
“Checking in. I love you. Here if you need to talk”.
If I take a step back and look at each one, not every flight has been coated in the visceral fight-or-flight (ha) feeling that going to Florida elicits. Most have been completely fine, and some have been enjoyable. I don’t want to associate flying with dread, and I don’t want to tie travel to grief.
A couple of weeks ago, I was flying to Atlanta for Kath and Mill’s wedding. My friends’ group text softened the familiar unease I felt that morning.
I checked my ticket. Window seat, ok, sick. Feeling better. Maybe I’ll get a mimosa, take a few GasX, and chug my water bottle like a state champ, who’s to say? As I approached my seat, a 20-something kid smiled at me from the aisle seat.
“I’m right there,” I said, pointing to the window seat.
“Great!” he responded, not moving but smiling up at me like I was gonna hand him one of those giant checks they have on The Price is Right. Another moment passed while I stood there with my eyebrow raised, the man behind me clearing his throat out of impatience.
“Mind getting up so I can slip in there?” He jumped up immediately, panicking over the armrest.
“Oh god, oh god. Ouch! Oh god. Ok, here I go. Sorry. Sorry sorry sorry.” He shuffled out of the seat, exiting on the side that would block me from entering the aisle.
“If you actually just scoot a little that way, I can bop right in.”
“Oh, JEEZ!” He said, embarrassed. I slid in, and he tumbled in after me, clenching and unclenching his hands. I slipped my right earbud into my ear.
“You’ll have to forgive me,” he interrupted, leaning over our conveniently empty middle seat to whisper into my earbud-free ear. “It’s my first flight ever.”
“Oh wow!” I said. Genuinely surprised.
“Yep. I’m feeling pretty incredible about it.” I tried to think of the last time I felt incredible or even good on a flight.
“Why Atlanta?” I asked as the flight attendant began her safety demonstration.
He leaned back into his seat, placed his hands on his lap, smiled, and said, “Just the beginning of my ENTIRE LIFE.”
The seat belt sign dinged, which startled him.
“This is when you buckle your seat belt,” I said, putting my other earbud in. “Enjoy the flight, it’ll be great.” He nodded vigorously, and I smiled back. Halfway through the flight, I looked at him, asleep and content, and blinked back warm little tears. When the plane landed, he was the first one up and out. Usually, I’d be annoyed at this, but it just further warmed my heart. He was in a hurry to start his life, everyone out of the way.
As I board my flight tomorrow, I will think of him. Not challenging trips, Haunted Ryan Cabrera, or even the woman who spit up her margarita at The Gasparilla Bar in the Tampa airport. Just my guy and the gumption to start again.
2025, here I come.
Amazing writing!!
Feel like I was there!