The First Step is the Longest
30 Sept 2004
Baltimore Washington International Airport USO
1930 hrs
Wow. Mom did not take this well at all. I’m very surprised to hear her get emotional, but then, I’m not a mom and it’s not my child who just hung up the phone in preparation to fly halfway across to world to a war zone.
I’m so ready to get on with the next leg of my journey. I realize it’s odd to cherish the idea of a 14-hour flight across the Atlantic to a destination hotter and more desolate than Area 51, but I’m tired and from here, it looks like 14 hours of uninterrupted rest.
At no time when I was packing my bags – a chore at which I astonished myself by shoving a bedroom full of chaos into two military duffels and a carry-on – did I ever expect to actually have to carry those suckers. Shit, that’s what Skycaps are for. I should have hired one, but I was short on cash so I thought I could handle four huge green duffels, one weekender stuffed full of bricks, an M-16, a laptop and a video camera case on one of those shopping carts you spend three dollars for and look so large when full of other people’s luggage. This, I found, is an illusion. By the time I made it to my terminal (which is as far away from the baggage claim as you can get without leaving the building) my right arm burned from coaching 370 pounds of luggage through three miles of airport on a cart that is determined to crash into everything to the right of it.
The USO has so far fallen short of Sergeant B’s predictions of generosity. No free stuff other than a bowl full of miniature candy bars and an internet connection.
I’m ready to go.
Baltimore Washington International Airport USO
1930 hrs
Wow. Mom did not take this well at all. I’m very surprised to hear her get emotional, but then, I’m not a mom and it’s not my child who just hung up the phone in preparation to fly halfway across to world to a war zone.
I’m so ready to get on with the next leg of my journey. I realize it’s odd to cherish the idea of a 14-hour flight across the Atlantic to a destination hotter and more desolate than Area 51, but I’m tired and from here, it looks like 14 hours of uninterrupted rest.
At no time when I was packing my bags – a chore at which I astonished myself by shoving a bedroom full of chaos into two military duffels and a carry-on – did I ever expect to actually have to carry those suckers. Shit, that’s what Skycaps are for. I should have hired one, but I was short on cash so I thought I could handle four huge green duffels, one weekender stuffed full of bricks, an M-16, a laptop and a video camera case on one of those shopping carts you spend three dollars for and look so large when full of other people’s luggage. This, I found, is an illusion. By the time I made it to my terminal (which is as far away from the baggage claim as you can get without leaving the building) my right arm burned from coaching 370 pounds of luggage through three miles of airport on a cart that is determined to crash into everything to the right of it.
The USO has so far fallen short of Sergeant B’s predictions of generosity. No free stuff other than a bowl full of miniature candy bars and an internet connection.
I’m ready to go.
posted by Axis at 7:30 PM
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