3/23/19
the other day my friend asked me if she could meet me outside my hotel & travel to the airport early in the morning with me: “you give me life & love and if you're awake enough and feeling social, it would be nice to hang out & make your trip a bit of a celebration for you. with maybe coffee & croissants in the car?” at first i wanted to say no: it’s so early! it’s in the opposite direction! i don’t want to inconvenience you! but isn’t care about inconveniencing yourself for others? or rather: isn’t intimacy about relating to one another outside of an economy of inconvenience & obligation? there are things more important than convenience — rather, there are people who surpass it. so i said yes (sheepishly) & there she was waiting for me downstairs early in the morning with croissants, a smoothie, & a wry smile. have you ever had a conversation with someone at the back of a car? the landscape moving in the background. it’s one of my favorite things: that sleepy glow of the morning inscribed on our faces, the sun peeking through, the wind animating every hair, like the things that are dead, they are not dead, they are alive...here. everything in motion. the crumbs & tears left in the car: a monument to being alive, together. as if being together is the only way we are alive. so often we only show up for the event, the episode, the meal. but what about the in-betweens? i feel most lonely in the in-betweens: after a party, after a show, after an event. how do we come down from that? how do we return to the tedium of reality? when we grow up: who tucks us in? i spend a lot of time in airports. what i like about airports are the people saying goodbye & the people saying hello. sometimes i come early or stay late just to watch the ritual of it all. there’s something about it that makes me feel at home. which goes to say i want to be holding a sign for you on the other side: “welcome home.” i want to be there for the journey. i don’t just want to take you home, i want to be that home. i don’t just want to see you, i want to move beside you. being beside in the in-betweens feels like the love i need & am only now learning to accept.
