Airport Bardo

I wakened this morning thanking God Almighty that I was in my own bed. I’ve just returned from ten days of intense travel: a ho’oponopono workshop in Woodland Hills, California; visits to my in-laws; a sandwich stay in Santa Fe with my ex-husband and best friend.

The trip was, of course, bookended by air travel. By the final taxi ride, I was certain that Murphy’s indubitable law of things going wrong was the ONLY operative one!

The trip to Burbank wasn’t too bad. It could have been because I was so looking forward to seeing my best friend from high school. She’s a friend with whom I don’t need to speak regularly and then, when we see one another again, we’re right back on the same page. Sari’s one of the favorite beings in my life.

I got on an earlier flight than I’d originally planned on Sunday—it should have made my arrival in Albuquerque more than three hours earlier than originally planned. Instead, we flew from Burbank to Phoenix, and there was a mechanical problem with the plane. Mechanical problems happen, I know. Then, US Airways “couldn’t find” (I quote) another plane that was working. Then, when they did, they didn’t have a pilot, so they flew one in from Philadelphia! (And just how Philadelphia is on the way to or from Phoenix, I still haven’t quite figured out!) Even though I paid an additional $65 to get to Albuquerque more than three hours earlier, I arrived ten minutes before I would have had I not made the changes.

Never mind.

The pièce de résistance was the trip from Albuquerque to Boston. We got up at 4 AM, showered and blew into a cab for a 6 AM departure. The flight to Dallas wasn’t bad.

When we got off the plane in Dallas, however, they’d cancelled our flight to Boston. Just summarily. No reason was given. For what it’s worth, if the gate agent had simply said to us, “You know, we at American Airlines are committed to doing everything we can to reduce our carbon footprint; the plane just wasn’t full enough to justify the fuel,” we might have at least felt like we were doing our bit for God and country. But no, she had no excuse, and didn’t seem to need to make one. And I’m not saying she was rude, for she wasn’t, she was charming as all Texas.

She waitlisted us for a 10 AM flight and put us on a 12:45 flight. There was no way we would be put on the 10 AM (we were numbers 15 and 16 on an oversold flight) which I figured out after we schlepped through half the airport and talked to another (more honest?) gate agent. She put us on an 11:35 flight. Why didn’t the first one? So we schlepped some more and got on and took off on time.

Okay . . . we’re on our way home. But are we?

The toilet began to stink almost immediately after take-off and it got worse and worse throughout the trip. As we were nearing our destination, Boston got the weather weirds. We were about to run out of fuel, so we had to put down in Hartford to get more. They kept us locked in the plane with the odoriferous head for 90 minutes. Oh, we’d gotten the fuel we needed but things were iffy in Boston still, or someone needed to clear us or whatever; the pilot was so inept with the microphone that all we heard was buzz-buzz-buzz-Boston-buzz-buzz. Finally, we take off again thinking it’s a spit till we’re in a cab on the way to our happy home.

Oh no. The luggage doesn’t get taken off the plane and put on its delivery spinner for 50 minutes—count ʼem, folks!—five-oh minutes. By the time we get both our suitcases . . . mine was one of the last off-loaded . . . get into a gypsy cab and go tearing through the tunnel to Somerville, we’re toast. No, we’re bread crumbs.

We staggered up the seventeen steps to our front door at 8 PM. Our original ETA had been 3.

Amazingly, this morning I was considering a little cosmic math. If ever we are called to do time in the Bardo, that in-between Heaven and Hell purgatory, we can faithfully point to our Sunday with American Airlines and affirm that we’ve already done it!

Professor Minerva McGonagall, the GPS

If you’ve ever driven in Boston, you know that the street sign situation is dire, a bona fide dearth. The conventional wisdom goes that if you don’t know where you’re going, you don’t belong here. I have lost count of the number of U-turns we’ve had to take.

Directionally-challenged or not, Boston will give you a run for your money. I swear that whoever the poor person was who had to enter Boston into Mapquest is now in Bellevue for a well-deserved rest.

We, however, allowing ourselves to catch up to the 21st century, have foiled Boston’s streets for the moment. Enter Professor Minerva McGonagall in a new format. If you’re a Harry Potter person, you know who she is: Deputy Headmistress of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. She’s been around the school forever, knows its, and its students’, ins and outs.

Professor Minerva McGonagall can always be counted on to give clear directions to anyone who asks her. That’s why we named our new TomTom One GPS device after her. She even knows how to get around Boston.

At the end of last week, we took her out for her maiden voyage to a place we knew how to get to, just to see if she’d take us the way we normally went. She did, but some of her directions were a little woolly {British English for unclear}. What we would have considered a turn, and Mapquest would have called a slight right, Minerva considered straight ahead. Oh well.

In Boston, even with a GPS device, one still has to know where one is going. Sort of anyway. No matter. The thing that cracked us both up was “disobeying” her directions, watching the device scramble for a new route when we did, and correcting our course after we finished our side trip.

One thing I get to do today is find a British-accented voice for our Professor. I’m hoping there’s a wonderful Maggie Smith-like one. I don’t know yet if our Professor will be quite as acerbic as Maggie’s Minerva, but it doesn’t matter. We had so much fun projecting her outrage on ourselves as we drove that it made the whole thing worth it.

“Can’t you be bothered to follow simple directions?” we howled. Each of us took turns playing the Professor’s well-meant corrective self. The thing I liked best though, really, was the idea that someone was in the car with me, wanting to get me where I wanted to go. And, that if I took a wrong turn, she has the capability of correcting my course.

Wouldn’t it be swell if we all had a Professor Minerva McGonagall within? I think so.

When To Let Go

Throughout the fall, I have been the project manager for a major renovation in our Victorian home. The porches were falling off our 1889 Grande Dame. As of today, they’re done. Much more solid. Beautifully constructed. Done.

I need to qualify that . . . done, except for the rotten paint job on the decks. The painter hired by our contractor was a little flaky, not too responsible, and delayed too long so the weather got cold and the paint wouldn’t dry. Now we have to wait till spring to have the decks redone properly. That’s the long and the short of it.

What I want to write about is: how do you know when to let go?

Here’s how I know:

When I’ve tried everything I can think of to create resolution, and the situation won’t resolve.
When all signs indicate that pushing isn’t going to resolve it.
When it involves things I can’t control (like weather.)
When I feel my energy flag every time I think about the situation.

Recently a dear friend went to New York City to visit and consider moving back there. I said to him,

“Follow the energy.”

It proved to be exactly what he needed to do. It’s good advice for everything.

Do what you can in any given circumstance, then honestly assess where you are. Things can’t always be resolved when I want them to be. But I can always be resolved when I follow the energy. It’s much less tiresome than pushing, and things get resolved peaceably.

As we approach the ever-stressful holidays, dear one, follow the energy. You will be delighted at how it simplifies your life.

When the weather becomes consistently warm here in Boston, come, say, April or May, we’ll have the porches painted and sealed properly. All is well.