Luggage Struggles

 The transatlantic plane ride was long and just a smidge uncomfortable as I was the middle of an aisle section. Unfortunately, I couldn't catch a wink of sleep on the flight but the flight did make up for it by having flash little flat screens on the head rests letting the passengers watch recent film releases. I was quite excited to watch the Avengers again and I sat through some of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate factory.

We finally touched down at Heathrow on Tuesday morning and we taxied for a further ten minutes before we filed out of the airplane. Up to that point I was starting to get some idea of how multicultural London was going to be. I mean I read all the stats about the place and I understand that it is when of the larger cities on the planet. I must say, however that Heathrow was like landing on Coruscant. A reference that most Londoners seem to get, which I will expand upon momentarily. My first true hit of cultural shock was I did not hear a word of English until about an hour into our escape from the airport. That may read a bit harsher than I may intend but for me it was quite a change from my comparatively small hamlet.

After we collected our luggage we had some herculean tasks ahead of us. First, we had to get out of the effin' airport. Second, we had to make it to our apartment and check in. Third, we had to sleep the sleep of the dead. Jet leg was creeping on us both and it showed in the most obvious ways. Getting on the tube proved challenging . We had four failed attempts at receiving our Oyster cards thanks to the peculiarities of the dispensing machines. Right when I was about to unpack our suitcases and craft a lean-to out of some of my shirts and ties, Elizabeth got out of the line she had been stuck in for half an hour with a ticket to Stockwell.

So, we got on the train near 11 and the train ride was a further 40 minutes. By twelve we made it to our neighborhood. I had previously told our landlords that we would be checking in at 12 but that clearly wasn't going to happen as I immediately got Elizabeth and I lost. I had only ever google mapped our apartment building so I had a great idea where the landmarks were from a bird's eye view. I knew it was right next to Larkhall park. I mean, how hard could it  be to find a large park in London? Apparently, difficult enough that I hadn't the foggiest idea on how to get there. I lead Elizabeth about 20 minutes past the right turn we needed to take. A grievous error as we were both literally dragging at that point. Elizabeth's luggage wheels broke so we were slowly grating the bottom of it into a fine black powder.

All this was exacerbated by my stubborn insistence that flagging down a cab would be a worthless expense. Since, I knew "it was right around here". I began to ask passerby if they knew where the park was and surprisingly every person I stopped and asked was either "not from around here" or "didn't have any idea but it sounded familiar." After the fourth non-answer I took the hint and walked a bit further on where a sales assistant in a local mattress supply store looked up the directions on her IPhone.

Twenty minutes back and a further ten up the road and we found the park and managed to check in at around two.

Roads go ever ever on/ Under cloud and under star,

On the tenth day of September, twenty-five years after I had been born, I stood beside my wife outside the MOV airport in Parkersburg. I was certainly whelmed by the dinky size of it. There was nothing to it really. Might have about ten employees on hand. Our family outnumbered them by at least one. Everyone was there to see us off and it was quite nice to be able to spend some time with them while my brain attempted to crawl down my spinal cord to hide within my stomach.

Oddly enough, my anxiety had next to nothing to do with the actual flying bit. Though the prospect of crashing did lurk the in deeper recesses. I had built up crossing through security as some sort of great and terrible thing. Months prior I would scour news site for horrendous travel stories involving the invasion of privacy and various hoops a traveler would have to leap through to make it onto the plane. This curiosity was driven from an odd personality quirk I had tried to bury from my youth. I was hyper-guilty.

The scenario always played out like this: a teacher, RA, police officer, etc. would speak to a: class, floor, group and accuse an anonymous member of some wrong doing: cheating, shitting on the floor, trespassing and no matter how certain I was of my innocence I would physiologically react as though I was being tortured on the rack. I was always seconds away from blurting out "Yes! It was me! I shit all over the floor!"

So, the thought, and just the thought, of airport security was the worse thing I could think of. I was certain out of the 4 other people on our tiny flight to Cleveland I would look too shifty and would be escorted stage right to a dimly lit back room with a "Hang in there" kitten poster haphazardly hanging on one wall while I was cavity searched thoroughly by a bored security guard.

Luckily, none of that happened. Though I did have to go through the metal detector a few times until it was realized that my new passport holder with a RFID blocker in it was causing the machine to ping off. Having made it through security we were able to board the first leg of our journey. The plane was a small one with twin propellers. It seemed like I was climbing into a sort of antique, or better yet something from an Indiana Jones film. Elizabeth and I tried to wave to our family waiting in the glass enclosed airport but it appeared that the glass was tinted in such a way that prevented them from seeing us.

The plane ride was actually quite smooth and fairly enjoyable. With each gain in altitude it seemed like my anxieties were falling away bit by bit until I was finally exposed to the great mystique and marvel of the whole endeavor. I was flying through the air toward another country.

I was moving 3,000 miles toward the night, toward London, toward the next year.  

Our bags were packed, we were ready to go.

      More than a year ago, when Elizabeth was about to finish her year in AmeriCorps, we began to discuss our options for school and life in general. We came to the conclusion that we both wanted to be as educated as possible. After some failed attempts to find a graduate program on the East Coast we looked again into what was once a pipe dream of moving 3000 miles to London and study at the universities there. Fast forward four or so months, and the bulk of the research was over and we had both applied and were accepted to institutions abroad. 

      I know when I received the offer email I was certainly elated but at the same time couldn't shake the sense of surrealism about the process. In fact, that kind of disconnect with the whole process really colored how I felt about the move until the day we set foot onto the plane. Everything we arranged was done without any real human contact. Sure, we sent emails. Enquiries were answered with surprising promptness despite the five hour time delay. Emails though quickly lost any sort of human touch and I felt adrift in this (at least for me) fully realized digital age. 

The other factor that honed my personal sword of Damocles, was the slipperiness of the time involved.It seemed we were always rushing to complete something just so we could wait for months, or at least weeks to find the next step. Like some sort of hellish scavenger hunt. Of course, time soldiered on. Generally oblivious to my pathetic fallacy. The move went from being far off in the future to next week, and tomorrow. All too quick really. Especially toward the end. Far too quick. 

Despite all the existential angst and emotional difficulty we did find our way over the pond and into a flat. Those details i'll post tomorrow.