the airport jitters

I thought had I improved on my departure technique after I cried only once when leaving San Francisco, as compared to when I left for college and broke down at regular intervals for several weeks. And I held myself together well in New York too, until this afternoon. After my last goodbyes, I made it back to my friend’s apartment, stood outside, twiddled the keys in my hand, and managed to convince myself that it was not, in fact, her apartment, and that there must just be another Bushwick avenue in Brooklyn, or that I was mis-remembering her address.

I made a few panicked phone calls, which went unanswered, and then walked a couple of blocks to see if anything, a gas station, a seafood restaurant, might be recognizable. They weren’t. I started to choke back sobs, and repeat to myself: “I KNEW this would happen. I’m lost in Brooklyn and I won’t have my suitcases when I leave and I’ll never make it to Moscow!!!”

I knew, though, that I was being irrational, and walked back to the original apartment that I had found. Suddenly, it did look like the right door, and, glory, the key fit in the lock, and the second key fit in the second lock, and the third key fit in the third lock! (There was a pneumonic device, involving a kidnapping story, to remember the order of the various keys.)

Maybe my body and mind reach an agreement that, for the sake of everyone concerned, it’s best for me to get my anxious sobs out when I’m alone, before I embark on the actual trip. It’s a last nervous ritual that keeps me calm for the rest of the journey. After all, here I am, sitting at the airport, hours before my flight, successfully welcomed through security, guarding my passport and ticket lovingly, and I can think to myself: “Well, I already almost got lost in Brooklyn….What else can go wrong?” If something is supposed to go wrong on every trip, as it invariably does, better to invent it yourself and get it out of the way early.

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Ah, but I see now that my flight is nine minutes delayed. I will now start wondering whether this delay, this delay that is sure to lengthen, will make me miss my second flight to Moscow.

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