A Travelogue, and Some Introspection

"And then it hit me: in her eyes, I'm an adult." --John Mulaney

Right.

I'm at a hotel bar in the airport equivalent of the suburbs (about two miles from the terminals, but still close to the huge, fenced-off cement circles that are probably airplane-roundabouts or some such), nursing an ice water that's comically placed in a stout glass while I wait for my dinner. It's 9:27.

Tomorrow I'll write a blog post about reading American Gods on an airplane, and about the author Neil Gaiman and his effect on my life. I will spend lots of tomorrow on planes and buses, working my way up to Skye, and I will have plenty of time. Tonight I am tired. There is a queen bed waiting for me, just upstairs, and all that stands between me and it is a hummus wrap and chips, and revising of what I'm typing up now, so this'll just be a travelogue post.

Yesterday I was nervous, and a bit scared, and sad that I would be leaving my home and cat for so long. I packed, discovered that my pack weighed far too much, repacked such that my pack weighed only a little too much, so as I could take it on the plane without incident. I spent an evening saying goodbye to sundry grandmothers, brothers, and friends of the latter, ending the evening with three hours' sleep. At 4:30 AM, the alarm (Radiohead's "Optimistic") blared from my phone speakers, and the migration day began.

Shower, blinking in bleary bewilderment, walking to car, blinking in bleary bewilderment, getting slightly lost, blinking in bleary bewilderment, getting to the airport, blinking in bleary bewilderment. A final goodbye, this one to my sweet, selfless mother, who had driven me to Boston Logan. Security was pleasantly uneventful, and I hung around in Terminal E for a spell, messing about with such things as breakfast potatoes and sunrises.

(A sparrow had been caught by a humane catch-and-release bird trap in the food court. It chirped with an irritated tone. I called MassPort and they said they'd take care of it. I hope it's alive.)

ON THE AIRPLANE THEY SPOKE WITH BRITISH ACCENTS IT WAS SO CUTE

I read American Gods for the entirety of the flight (more about that tomorrow) and enjoyed British Plane Breakfast and British Plane Mid-day Buttie. Once at Heathrow, I stood in line and read Gods for forty minutes, looking up and shuffling three feet now and then, until at last I was processed at Customs by Rubeus Hagrid's young cousin.

From there it was but a hop, a skip, and a shuttle train to the free bus to my hotel. The bus driver was deliciously sarcastic when I didn't notice my stop (*heavily Greek accent* "Who's getting off at Leonardo? Me? Am I getting off at Leonardo? No, you!"), and the entire bus yelled and pointed helpfully when I, with the instincts of a stoned chipmunk, set off in the opposite direction from the hotel sign.

In my hotel room, which was delightfully appointed and beyond fault, save that only one light worked, a melancholy set in. The second half of the day had been bizarre: everyone from the airport staff to the bus driver to the people who just sat there being English expected me to have my shit together, despite the self-evident fact that I'm a baby on stilts. And I did deliver to a great extent (didn't lose my passport, didn't get lost, didn't inadvertently start a chain of events leading to thermonuclear war). In my room, with nothing left to do but take a relaxed shower and proceed down to supper, all the stress released at once into a sadness. I was alone in Europe, with no friends to chill with, lonely and out of sorts.

I'd been expecting this. It's happened every time I traveled solo; all the fuss and furor seems a bit pointless without a companion to commiserate, eat, and snore with. Travel, my whole life, has been something that happens with or to other people. It doesn't fit in my scheme of things that I, just me, am "worth" all the expense.

And that, more than anything else, is the demon I'm aiming to exorcise this spring. Indeed, as I write (the sandwich was good, if a bit small), I feel much happier than I did upstairs. It would seem I don't need anyone to experience jet lag with and get mad at, not so long as I can do a nice bit of writing at the end of the day. Oh, I'll make friends, certainly--a businessman from Baltimore just came down from Scotland, he's thrilled I'm heading up that way--but I hope that by my trip's end, I can sit in a restaurant, sans book, sans company, and enjoy it as purely as if all my best friends were there.

And if not, at least I'll have had my passport stamped by Hagrid's cousin. Whatever happens, no one can take that away from me.