What a year this has turned out to be, indeed.
Back in January, I had no particular plans for the year. I had a vague idea of a book I wanted to write, but otherwise I found myself stuck in a torpid state. My plans to open my bakery had been scuttled—admittedly, scuttled by my own self, but it was my own self who realized that I qualified for a tenth of the financing that I needed, and I had nowhere to go without making a radical change I could not afford (literally, from a financial standpoint) to make. I had this grand idea that with plenty of planning, we could have a house, a business and a baby all within an 18-month period. Neither the house, nor the business, nor the baby have yet been made manifest; whether they ever will is a mystery. I spent weekends stuck inside the house while subzero-chilling winds beat against the walls of our building, thinking We have to get out of here, we have to go somewhere?, but where was I going to go? I hadn’t been on an airplane in five years, and was not in a hurry to get on another one any time soon.
By the end of the month, I learned that I won the chance to go write in Arkansas, and the choice was mine, to take it, or to mewl and puke about what a wuss of a flyer I am. I chose the former. I had a lark. I came home and promptly slipped back into a funk. Well, that’s it for me, I said. I’m not going anywhere for the rest of the year. It was in this annoying and pouty mood that I found myself when an IM popped up from the lovely Snowball.
“So what are you doing for Labor Day?” she asked.
Thus do I find myself not only on my second air trip in two months, but I find myself doing it on a massive travel weekend, in the company not only of Labor Day holidaymakers but also a few thousand Republicans ready to get the hell out of Sin City and go to wherever home is. And I can’t wait to do it, can’t wait to get in line at the airport, can’t wait to take off my shoes for the nice TSA people, can’t wait to see clouds flutter past my window, can’t wait to walk through the sliding glass doors and look for the little blue chariot awaiting me.
If you don’t hear from us this weekend, it is probably because we are out raising high the roof beams. But in deference to my dear friend, and to everyone around us, I will try to refrain from shouting a giant Patrick-Warburton-as-David-Puddy-style “YEAAAAAAAHHHHHH!” I will try.
Happy weekend, all. See you Monday night, if not sooner.