Be realistic
This drawing of me was completed at dinner tonight by Tess.
I’m assuming the bad staccato hair and dark circles under, around, and surrounding my eyes are the result of the 20 airplane flights I’ve taken thus far in January, with four more to go this next week. Let me pause for a shout out to Franny who works at Laptop Lane in Terminal C in the Cincinnati Airport and who always knows me by name and asks how much longer I’ll be on crutches.
The fracture boot looks about right on that right foot, but I’m puzzled by the large hands. Wads of Biscoff cookies pilfered from my Delta flights? Pieces of Filson luggage stuffed to within an inch of their life in one hand and a 1-quart Ziploc storage bag filled with liquids, jells, and pastes in the other? Stumpy stubs of boxing gloves ready to attack for an upgrade? Mr Brilliant quietly notes that it looks like I’m reaching my arms out to hug her; after all, art is drawn from someone else’s perspective. I like his explantation best.
But mostly, I’m puzzled by the smile and thankful that she draws me that way, just glad that Tess sees a smile when I’m home between these frazzled days of travel, these tiny respites where washing underwear between trips is the pinnacle of planning and sheer, sheer joy.
I’ve had to be realistic this month about my ability to write with so many trips to prepare for and take and recover from, so much laundry and laughing to do between them, so many holiday cards left to send. What? The holidays are over?
And so, I’ll return. Some day when you least expect it, I’ll be here, back in the saddle.
I hate being realistic. It smacks of resignation, of smallness. And sometimes, just sometimes, when the air is so cold as it is now and there are rings around the moon, those nights when sounds ring clear and true in the atmosphere, when owls hoot and the river runs cold…sometimes, on that kind of a night when snow starts falling and my Delta Airlines upgrade finally shows up on the computer, not that I’ve been obsessively watching for it, sometimes on those nights, being realistic just smells a lot like sleep.
