It looked as if the flight to Chicago was overbooked. If the waiting area was any indication of the number of tickets sold, we were going to be packed in tight. I spotted a local couple and a nice lady in her late fifties across the way, we started comparing notes about whether or not we thought it preferable to fly a longer, direct route of eight hours duration or break up our journey by touching down in relief after a four hour zip across the Pacific. The ladies were of the same opinion that a direct, but longer route was preferable to a lay over which would actually cost you more hours of traveling time in the end. The husband and I were kind of voting on the side of getting off the plane in California to stretch our feet, and you know, be on land and stuff.The plane filled up pretty quick, except the seat next to me was vacant which struck me as fortuitous and yet, kind of scary. Who would i commiserate with when the plane was bouncing around the lewa lani? Yes, I hate to fly, and not for the reasons most people list: a lack of leg room, cramped seating quarters, or irritating seat mates---mostly I hate the turbulence and not being in control of a vehicle that I am in.I love leaving Honolulu for flights that are bound for the continent beyond California. The incongruity of seeing folks anxious to return home, yet unwilling to give up their last connection to Paradise as evidenced by an entire family swathed in lively parrot printed aloha-wear-that's fun-to-wear, never loses its appeal. I was lost in my reverie of parrot print, and exposed sunburnt flesh when my seat mate arrived carrying his overstuffed military issue camo pack, boots slung to its sides. A tall young man, he was dressed in a natty pair of black dress pants shot through with thin woven pin stripe. He also wore a blue dress shirt, baggy and casual, that also had stripes in it to echo the pants-- a white tank top, and a platinum bracelet whose sleek flattened links resembled the armor of a deadly kanapi. He had a matching necklace and diamond studs in his ears. A giant G faced watch completed his outfit. I found out from brother that he was off to visit family in Chicago before shipping out to Iraq on his fourth---------yes-----------fourth tour of duty. He had been in the Navy, and now was in the Army. After his third tour they asked him where he thought he would like to go next, and he said, "how about someplace like Paradise." So of course they shipped him to Hawai'i. Unfortunately what the Army didn't tell him was that the Hawai'i placement meant that he would be shipping back to Iraq again in no time at all. I thought well, if this guy can make it through three tours of duty in Iraq, we can make it across the Pacific and to Chicago, hell people aren't even shooting at us.The ride was malie and beautiful. I fell asleep once the in flight feel-good movie, August Rush, had ended---right after I saw that we had made it to California. I woke up once over the bumpy Rockies and fell back asleep until we were flying somewhere over the Midwest where snow cast crochet like patterns over mountains and deep into valleys. City lights appear out of that darkness and snow, iridescent like caches of opals glowing mutely, a beauty that cannot be fixed from anywhere else but forty-thousand feet in the air.We made our descent into Chicago through miles of dense mist that did not thin until we were just above the city. Brother leaned over my shoulder, mouth agape at the snow blowing patterns like shifting sand snakes slithering over the wing of the plane outside our window. "I thought you grew up here?" I said. "Nah, I'm from Louisiana." he replied.One hour waiting at O'Hare airport. The chicas selling bagels complaining about the metro sexual from South East Asia requesting two plates for he and his girlfriend----because they were going to split one bagel. From the staccato banter the couple shared in line, you would have assumed a more intimate division would be in order. "The nerve of that guy at 5:45 am asking for two platas!" the girl kept saying in Spanish. Where the hell does he think he is? was something I inferred from the tone in her voice. Mid rant she asked me for the second time if i would like cheese on my bagel. "Yes," I replied, "but I don't need a plate...."Another good thirty minutes after we boarded was spent waiting for them to de-ice the plane. It's like being on that Nickolodean kids show where they spray each other with green goo. My seat mate on this flight was a very nice, very well educated doctor who was studying for yet another area of expertise namely occupational therapy. She was in her mid-fifties and in graduate school for the third time. We chatted the two hours from Chicago to Boston about history, Hawai'i, and medicine. About schooling, being a woman in a professionalized vocation and raising our kids. As we made our descent into Boston overlooking the Atlantic, she recalled a boat ride with her brother and his family on July 4th and said that they had had a great time. I told her that fourth of July in Boston for me always meant attending the Mashpee Wampanoag Pow Wow. I told her that people sing and dance, there's great food, and my family gets to hang with our Wampanoag family. She all of a sudden got this far away look and said, "I wonder when my brother thinks the turning point was?" I was kind of like "What?" so I said, 'What?" and she said, "Well, we don't really get along anymore." So then I said, "so, what if it's that you don't get along for now, at this moment in time, and later it just gets better? Why does it have to be something that is cumulative and final?" And she thought about it for a bit and said, "huh, ya, maybe." She was off to the Caicos and Islands for Spring vacation. We exchanged contact information. I wonder if she'll drop me a line in future.Thirty more minutes waiting for my bags. By now all of the sunshiney parrot people have left---none of them were really bound this far East. People from New England returning home would never have put those clothes on, let alone to return home in public. Nope, the young men are wearing their long sleeved shirts underneath slouchy fashionable tees and baseball caps. The older ones have business suits on, with expensive dress shoes. Women are wearing boots up to hea and dressy pants with pullover sweaters and short, fitted jackets. It's the bags, cell phones and wedding ring bling that catches the eye. Conservative allusions to wealth. It's still forty degrees outside even though the sun is shining and it looks beautiful out. Once out of the airport, I went to the mall to buy me jeans that actually fit. Then we were off to the North End for some 'ono italian food, coffee and pastries.Yep, I slept for hours when I got home, and now at 3 in the morning I've just had some breakfast and can't sleep.
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