Timing travel… 10 February 2009

I have a love affair with travel, flight to be precise. It must be connected to my nearly insatiable need to be in motion, in transit, leaving here, going there, moving forward – literally or figuratively. Blame it on my nomadic upbringing, but the curiosity of finding myself surrounded by unknowns is a challenge I seem to consistently be chasing.

I went home for the holidays this year. It had been two years since I was home last for Heidi and Jake’s wedding. It was a splendid and relaxing vacation. I played games invented on the spot by my older nephews, who also taught me how to play tennis on the aptly named Wii. I flirted with my younger two nephews who already have heart-breaker qualities and made it extremely easy for me to fall madly in love with them. My sisters and I had wonderful talks that I wish we could have more often, if only we lived closer to one another. I had great conversations with my mom that continue to play-back in my mind. How does a mother’s identity change after thirty years of active motherhood slowly moves a woman towards being the caretaker of one – herself?

When I do travel, I do my best to time my flights properly. It’s a science, really. I schedule outbound flights to correspond with the rising sun and I time the descent of returning flights with sunsets. I like the conceptual connection of the dawn of adventure as I depart from my hometown of the moment. I also embrace the abstract of my adventure coming to an end as the daylight descends into night.

On my flight home I found myself thinking about the “why” of my travels. What is it about leaving and returning that is so magical? Here are some pictures and some words I strung together during that return flight…landing at sunset, of course.

look with flight speed
way down and across
a curdled-milk contrail
diagonally cuts
the crossword quilt
sewn by her hands
to comfort the 4-year-old boy
crying in seat B, aisle 33
salt-watered tears
mimic erosion flows
imprecise, confused
direction(less)
into and over
their complicated neighbors

dense, red light
breaks snowed-starved mountains
into baby pink tips
sharpened, carved
by extreme extremes
paler, and paler pinks
as the aircraft falls
in tandem with the sun
I am anxious to reconnect
my feet with their walking path
because even from this distance
gated bedroom communities
have beauty.

p.s. When I fly into cities I know well, I also select which side of the aircraft I want to sit on (go ahead, call me neurotic, I don’t mind). When flying into Oakland, I sit on the right side of the plane so I can peer down into Yosemite National Park as we pass over (sadly, it was clouded over this trip). I sit on the left side when flying out so that I can peer down upon San Francisco, where I went to university. We also fly over Candlestick Park, where I cut my teeth as a young photographer covering 49er’s games back in the days of Steve Young, Jerry Rice and a young kid named Terrell Owens.