If there is are lines of people waiting for something I’m going to pick the slowest one no matter what. It doesn’t matter if it’s waiting to check out at the grocery store or waiting to go through security at the airport, if there is a line I’m going to be in the slow one. Case in point I just got through security at Newark Liberty Airport. It’s really early here and they just opened up a security station so there were only a couple of people waiting to go through. I headed over to the short line thinking that fewer people in the line would translate to a shorter wait. Silly me. As soon as I got in line the guy at the head of the line started stirring up shit with the TSA people staffing the gate. I don’t think the guy spoke English and he evidently hadn’t been to an airport before so he didn’t think his luggage would be searched or something I don’t know but he was really upset which of course caused the TSA people get upset and the whole thing was a huge CF. Needless to say what I thought would be the fastest line became the slowest line so it took forever to get through. If this was an isolated incident it wouldn’t be a big deal but this sort of thing happens to me all the time. I’m like the Odysseus of lines. I’ve pissed off the line god and he’s not letting me through. Anyway, it’s time to wait in line to get on the plane so I’d better be going.
I’ve been spending some time in Iowa the state where I grew up. I was driving to the airport in Des Moines taking back roads feeling nostalgic. All of the corn is dry and ready to harvest the ditches and gullies of gray dead grass hiding deer and pheasants. This used to be my favorite time of year. The time of hunting dogs, shotguns and early mornings in the field. My eyes are still programmed to see certain motion patterns that indicate a duck, a deer, a rabbit. I think of passing on the unspoken things that my father passed on to me. Quiet masculine companionship, hunting, breath fogging the cold air, love of nature, life and death.
I grew up in a town that would be the cultural equivalent of Wonder Bread so one of the things I like about my job is that is that I get to know people from all over the world. I was talking to one of my Chinese friends today and mentioned something about her recent marriage ( something she said made me think she was recently married ). She corrected me saying that she had a college age daughter (which I already knew) and that I should infer from this that she had been married many years. I responded that the daughter could have been from a previous marriage. She replied she was old fashioned. Then she said ‘When you marry a dog you become a dog. When you marry a pig you become a pig’. I’m really not sure what sort of ancient Chinese wisdom she was trying to pass on but it does exemplify what I enjoy about interacting with people from other places. Every so often I’m surprised by some idiom or custom like celebrating Maslenitsa or learning how to really insult someone in Tamil.
