(Part One of our Chicago adventure is here. Also, just as a warning, this post is LONG. Apparently I have a problem with brevity when recapping vacations, so I would advise you to grab some snacks now. And also maybe your cane and some Metamucil, in case you turn another year older while reading this.)
We were at our friends Alison and Nathan's house on Friday night, playing Trivial Pursuit and drinking Kahlua and cream---hey, we know how to do the weekend up right---when this amazing sound suddenly started coming through the iPod speakers, the sort of sound that stops you in your tracks and makes you sit up a little bit straighter.
"What is this?" I asked, like a vegetarian who's just tasted bacon. Or a person who's just tasted Kahlua and cream.
I don't know why it always takes me such a long time to realize it---or why it's such a huge surprise to me every single time---but when I'm going to the gym regularly, I just feel a whole lot better about things. I sleep better, I work harder, I worry less. My body morphs from something that frequently irritates and disappoints and surprises me into something strong and proud, something capable of speed and agility and momentum. My mind is clearer, my skin is clearer, and sure, it doesn't hurt that my pants fit a little better too.
Hi! Are you from a country that isn't America, but also isn't England, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, or pretty much any other country where English is the first language? If so, do you live in America (or Canada)? Do you have a blog? Could you please email me if you meet all of these criteria?
I promise it's not as mysterious as it sounds. I mean, I'm not, like, going to ask to see your Green Card or anything; I just need to ask you something. All will be revealed, I promise. Leave the briefcase on the bench. The red bird flies at midnight.
When I left Charleston to travel around Asia for six months and then move to San Francisco, I didn't think I'd be away long. I figured I'd hop a cheap flight back sometime soonish, see all my friends, hit up my old haunts. But now here we are just shy of two years later, and I haven't been back since Sean and I drove that big old U-Haul down our street on a blistering June morning, waved, wept, and were gone.
You know what I don't really want to see again for a very long time? I don't really want to see another airport. In the last five days alone, I've walked through, waited in, and shaken my fist at six---San Francisco, Washington Dulles, Charleston, Charlotte, Orlando, and Denver---and now they're all starting to blur together in a terrible montage of Wolfgang Puck Express sandwiches and endless moving walkways.
I started very, very tentatively packing for Singapore this evening---which is to say that I kind of assembled a bunch of stuff in random piles on my bedroom floor---and I kept putting sunscreen-type things in a corner together before I realized that oh my god, I have, like, fifteen different sunscreen-type things to take to Singapore. And also: wow! This means I am going on vacation!
My brother Tom was in town this weekend, and we picked him up at the airport on Saturday morning---or, should I say, we tried to pick him up at the airport on Saturday morning but, um, we couldn't, BECAUSE HE WAS BEING HELD IN THE CUSTODY OF THE UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY.
Oh my god, am I sick of packing. And unpacking too, and re-packing, and any activity that has "packing" in its name (meatpacking?), and I know it's a little hard to feel sorry for me---waaah!
My flight to Singapore was uneventful, or at least as uneventful as an eighteen hour flight can be. It was set to take off from San Francisco at 1am, so once I'd found my seat, I propped my head on my pillow and closed my eyes while waiting for the rest of the passengers to board. When I opened them what I thought was a few minutes later, I was disgruntled to see that people were still milling about in the aisles. "Can't they get organized?" I bristled to myself.
A friend once told me about a guy she knew who hated going to the bathroom anywhere but his own house. If he was out and found he suddenly had some, uh, business to attend to, he'd hightail it back to his own facilities rather than perch his buttocks on the rim of an unfamiliar porcelain throne.
Apparently, there is a guy living in my parents' apartment building who has the exact opposite problem.
I wake up every morning like a deep sea diver coming up for air, shooting to the surface of wakefulness. Sleep has been deep and pitch-black and all-consuming---the grateful sleep of a person who finds, with a sudden relief, that there are more of her loved ones in close proximity than not in close proximity---but the room is always flooded with sunlight when I wake, the blind deliberately left open the night before to guarantee it.
