My alarm clock went off at 6:11. Not unusual – it always does. So I rolled over and hit snooze, like I always do. Nothing to get to today…
Whoa!
My eyes flew back open. There was something… some reason this morning was different. It took a split second to filter through the remnants of the dream I’d been having.
I had a flight to catch!
Suddenly wide awake, I hopped out of bed and into the shower. Then I hopped out of the shower and into my clothes, wondering what exactly I’d been thinking when I packed my deodorant last night. I threw my toothbrush and lens case into my knapsack.
And then it was 7:00 and I had nothing to do.
On second thought, I switched my tweezers from my carryon to my check-in luggage. Just in case.
Now what?
Um…
Well, morning chat with God: “Hey, I’m coming to visit. Have you got some of that great weather you served last time I was over?”
Breakfast – better make it a big one. Can’t tell when I’ll next eat. Not sure when the flight leaves. If a plane lands at 8am in Israel, flies for 11 hours, and crosses seven time zones… what time does it leave NYC?
Insufficient information. Need either the airspeed and mileage or just how long it will take to cross a time zone.
Hm, maybe I should take some of those great strawberry pecan muffins left over from Shabbos. I’m sure nobody else wants to eat them. And who knows when I’ll need a snack?
Should I take a few more snacks? Those flights are long and boring, and boredom makes me hungry. Surely even a humongous schnitzel salad won’t keep me satiated for 18 hours straight. Is it 18 hours? How much time do we lose on the trip? It might be shorter. Or longer. Maybe bring some more food. Travel makes me hungry.
If I’d have travelled more often in the past, I could probably get there under my own power, now, as a blimp.
Cram in a last-minute package from the neighbor: “If you can’t fit it all, then can you just bring the shoes and shirts?” No problem: I can fit it all. And also the five-pound roast my mother is handing me? Yeah sure. And also these socks? Ahdunno, it’s getting heavy.
Do I have to declare it at customs if I’m bringing in enough children’s clothing to stock a small store? Or clothe half Jerusalem?
The phone rings.
“Hello you want ghteaodg?”
“Excuse me?”
“You want gh9rghdff?”
I take a wild guess about why someone who can hardly pronounce English would be calling me at 7:30 in the morning.
“Are you calling about the car to the airport?”
“Yes. 8 o’clock?”
“Uh huh.”
“Lincoln Town Car good?”
“Very good.”
Though all my own stuff fits into a knapsack and carryon, I needed a car to get the children’s boutique over.
The car service driver drove like, well, a car service driver. Before we left Brooklyn he’d already enraged everyone on the road and was probably averaging about 5 miles per gallon. Not that there were many people on the road on Labor Day. We got there in a half hour. Two Irishmen were blocking the luggage cart dispenser, discussing all the pubs they’d hit in their tour of America. That’s one way to see the country, I suppose. I shooed them away, blanched at the price of a cart, and forked it over.
The driver loaded it up, and I pushed.
The cart stalled. I sighed. For five bucks I’d landed a faulty cart. I pushed down hard on the handle and shoved. It moved smoothly. I frowned. Push, pull, shove… ah… when you push the handle down, it moves. When it’s level, it stops.
I had about 100 feet to go to the Nefesh B’Nefesh table, which was barely visible due to the boxes stacked around it. Most of the boxes seemed to be labeled “caps.” Others were more inexplicable, like a box that seemed to contain a small pink children’s pup tent.
Left with an hour and a half to kill, naturally, I decided to blog…
