On My Way

I actually wasn’t planning to blog today, but I’m feeling so bright and sparkly on my journey here that I want to open up and express. I put all the finishing touches on my to-do list 10 minutes before I left home. That translates into realizing I should just throw away all my old spices and give Shelly one more kitchen cabinet to inhabit (or rather for her stuff to inhabit).
I should have been tired this morning because I stayed up until one packing and repacking. This time I have two large suitcases and they had to hold all my most necessary belongings for living in Alaska for many months. I kept zipping each one then stepping on the bathroom scale to make sure I was as close to 50 pounds as possible without going over. If you go over, there’s a hefty fee. If you’re under, you just shortchanged yourself. So one suitcase weighed 45 but the other 49 and back and forth, back and forth until finally, both weighed exactly 47 and a half. I might could have squeezed one more emery board into each, but I know tempting fate when I see it. When I checked in I asked the checker how much my bags weighed and he looked at me dubiously and declared, “49 pounds each.” Hallelujah! If only I could be that efficient with the important things.
The airport was a piece of cake (or rather a Starbucks and a cinnamon curl) then easy boarding and another great seat. Once again (if you remember my summer trip) I am by the window and the middle seat is empty. Yes! There’s a middle-aged guy in the opposite seat with his laptop out also. We have our drinks on the middle tray and it’s kinda like we’re in a café sharing a small table. I like this.
I am reading a GREAT book! It’s Traveling Mercies by Anne Lamott. I like it because my dear niece, Ellen, gave it to me to read. She knows me pretty well and thought I’d like it (She also knows what music I like and regularly gives me CD’s that introduce me to artists she likes). The book is subtitled, “Some Thoughts On Faith”. It’s fairly autobiographical and like Ellen warned me, probably not appreciated as much by the far right wing ultra-conservative Christians (the f-word appears more than once). I must be becoming more liberal these days because I love this book. I think the last five years have opened me up some, painfully like surgery, but the end result feels like healing. I accept and even appreciate things these days that in another life I would have judged or scoffed (But not to worry. I won’t be dropping f-bombs at the Vermeer family Christmas reunion).
Lamott’s style is so unpreachy, so vulnerable, self-effacing and humorous. She endured some enormous heartaches before emerging as a single mother bent on finding answers to life’s questions in the Christian faith. She reminds me of Connally Gilliam whose book Revelations of a Single Woman I read recently and also loved. I’m finding myself identifying with these single young women (okay you can laugh). We actually face many of the same struggles and certainly sip the same cocktail of hope, fear, and determination (I won’t be drinking liquor at the Vermeer reunion either so relax).
I’m going to close my computer now and keep reading and also batting my eyelashes at my unsuspecting date across the table. Wink Wink ( ;