A Vacation Journal

A Vacation Journal

Vacations - while most people are familiar with them, I’m mostly not. Not at all. They’re completely foreign to me. It’s taken me quite a few years to see the value in them. For starters, I’m pretty much a workaholic. I also am more uptight flying now than I ever was. I flew a lot as a kid, my mom worked for an airline & we flew back home to Ohio from California. I was at LAX quite a bit in those days. I can remember going into work with my mom on a Saturday to watch the 747s arrive & depart - they were new in those days. 

I also remember passing by the planes that took servicemen off to Viet Nam. I remember asking my mom if I was going to have to fly on one of those planes someday.

“I certainly hope not.”, she answered. Turns out I never did. Thank God. Flying never bothered me as a young child, nor did getting stuck in airports having flown on standby.

I wanted to know how fast the plane went to take off, and how fast the plane went when it was in the air. I don’t think I ever found out. Not really sure I want to know now.

Okay, enough nostalgia from my fond memories of flying as a kid. It’s a whole different game now. For starters, there’s 911 and some lesser bullshit that has totally changed the game. Turns out my enough nostalgia jumped the gun a bit. In my childhood flying days - and they flew by (see what I did there?), we’d go up to the gate and wait anxiously for the plane that my grandparents or an aunt or uncle were on.

When it was time for them to go back home, we’d watch the plane from the time it boarded until the thing became a dot in the sky that faded out of sight. Loved ones were on these planes. 911 took that away from us all, and some people will never know that experience. It’s one of my favorite childhood memories. Gone. I gotta say that even as an adult, I miss that. Yeah, I’d still do it if I could. Anyone with me?

I suppose that’s fine in keeping all of us safe. What isn’t helping to keep anyone safe, is that f-you attitudes that airlines have pretty much taken with their customers nowadays. Flight canceled, delayed or routed somewhere else? So? What are you gonna do - take a train? Drive? Whatever. What’s that? Now you’re not getting into your destination on time, nor are you flying to your first connection. Add five hours to you arrival time. Plans? So?

That’s how my vacation, the first one I’ve had in more years than I want to mention, started this morning. Found out that our first connection canceled. From there it only got worse. Supposed to leave at 12:30 PM, it got a little better when they told us we would leave an hour earlier, but that ended up being untrue. Doesn’t matter anyway, because instead of flying into Chicago for our connection flight, and then on to Seattle, now we’re flying into Dallas. The Hell I wanna go to Dallas for? Because it’s now where they tell me I have to go to connect and get to Seattle. Really? You couldn’t find a state a little bit closer up the waistline?

Presently it’s not looking like we’re getting to Seattle today - unless we get lucky & get on a standby. Our bags may get there long before us. Speaking of bags, I’m not gonna lie: I’m in no way adept at packing - for anything, much less a vacation. Mind you I’m trying to be in the moment and grab all the enjoyment I can from these few days, but right now our plans have been radically altered. I’m on a plane full of people with changed plans today folks. None of us are happy about it, at least I wouldn’t think so. Oh hey, howdy - lucky me going to Dallas today instead of the airport that has my name. There ain’t nothin’ in Texas got my name, I’ll tell you what...y’all.

Is it a good day to fly? Well, yes and no. Yes because at least now we’re flying, no because the lot of us ain’t flying where we thought we were. 

There’s no good way to transition into my dislike of heights that makes me less thrilled with flying as an adult. As a kid, flying thrilled the B Jesus outta me. Every time. I’ve no idea where that went. Perhaps it went out the window when I was flying a lot back and fourth to Houston on account of a woman I’d stumbled into a long distance relationship with. I spent a lot of time in airports, and post 911, much of that time was a lot less favorable on the memories that I want to hang onto scale. Lots of things went out the window in Texas, made me sing Robert Plant’s line from Hot Dog....(...and I’ll never go to Texas anymore) - shoo-whee-howdy-shucks, I’m goin’ to Texas. 

Add all of this up so far and we’ve gotta have a pretty good explanation of why there are bars in airports and why people drink in them. I’m now en route to Texas. It’s 12:32 PM and I ain’t had no drink yet. I suspect that when I land at DFW, I’m gonna want more than a drink. I believe I’ll want a drank - thanks, turbulence! And thanks for not working, italics button on my iPad. Fucking, yay....y’all. Oh and I’m gonna wanna eat to - but I don’t have a hankerin’ for BBQ. I suspect when I land in Dallas, I’ll be hungry enough to eat a stack of bar napkins if they have the right cheese & sauce on them. If there’s one thing I most definitely do not have fond memories of, it’s airport food. It’s usually the worst of the worst service too. Hot damn, y’all. I’m GIT me some room temperature barbecue. Looking like another hour plus in the air. I vaguely remember being excited as a kid when my airplane food arrived. Seem to recall that usually being a disappointment. Soda. Soda was not a disappointment - I don’t drink soda anymore.

Airplane entertainment is much better these days - or it would be if I were a big movie/tv person. I’m not really, and the appeal is even less when I get forced into it. Speaking of force, that turbulence is quite a force this afternoon. I’m trying to write, read a bit - I’d just as soon not have my words all bounced around. I don’t want the American Airlines app for in flight WiFi - well I didn’t think I did. But like a kid whose little brother or sister wants to play with one of my toys that I haven’t touched in weeks, now I do. Can’t get it now, you have to download it before you take off. Where is that waitress in the sky? Can I get a turbulence Martini? Don’t worry, the shake is taken care of.

I bet you didn’t know I’d have a bowl of cry baby soup on the plane, did you? Yup, me neither. I didn’t sleep last night, figured I’d sleep on the way. The captain just came on said we’d have “just a few more minutes of this not so smooth ride” - minutes can be a long time. It’s a long time in a wrestling match - high school or college, not WWF bullshit steroid/fake blood/chair smashing wrestling, and certainly not bear wrestling. Trust me, two minutes is a long time sometimes. I don’t remember ever being bothered by that as a kid. Different story now. How’s that when I was afraid of quite a bit more back then. Maybe I’m just afraid of different things these days - heights, and more specifically, dropping from them being but one.

We’re off to a good...well, we’re off to a start. Could be worse - I could still be standing at the check in counter and being told something like, yeah...you’re not flying into Chicago, and now Dallas is a wash (y’all), now we’re routing you to Hawaii - oh wait, that’s nowhere near as good as it sounds (again, thanks for not complying w/my over thinker/writer’s wishes here, iPad iTalics) - most people would love to go to Hawaii, but for a lot longer than the 20 minutes we’ll have you there. Oh you’re gonna be hungry, probably need a pit stop too, but save your aloha - ain’t none of you got time for that. Why? Because we’re gonna route you from Hawaii back towards one of the Dakotas and get you to Seattle from there. Makes sense to you? Yeah, not to us either - no, we don’t have to explain it to you - why?? We don’t care - we’re an airline, and we don’t have to.

I’ll update when I know just how many states I’ll touch today.