Category Archives: Travels

Travels

All I Want

We drove through the grey chill of Boston, 5:00 AM from our friend Caroline’s apartment in Cambridge to the airport. Hours later we walked out of the Bakersfield airport into a brilliantly sunny day, temperature in the 80s and heading up.

After our meeting in Bakersfied, we drove to Van Nuys, listening to Joni Mitchell’s albumn “Blue”. This album is nearer to perfection than any I can think of. It was the soundtrack of my first year living in Geneva when I was 23. The first song, “All I Want,” inspired our wedding vows with the line “All I really really want our love to do is to bring out the best in me and in you.” Fortunately Dave likes it too. I once stopped dating a boy because he didn’t.

When we got to the hotel I crashed completely and Dave put in a few hours of work. I don’t know what came over me, but it was nothing 12 hours of sleep couldn’t cure.

Travels

Leavin’ on a jet plane

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We are leaving in less than 12 hours and I haven’t packed. So what to do? Blog entry, of course.

I woke up at 5:15 AM wondering if the coffee machine had done it’s magic yet. And then “To Do” list items started scrolling across my mind so I got up and started writing them down. Dave woke up and started chiming in with his items. Cammy heard the activity and came in for a good back-scratching session. Nearly two hours later and I’ve gotten a lot done. No where near making a dent in that list, ‘though.

List making is my salvation and my downfall. It’s a fine line. If I overlist, I freak myself out and accomplish nothing. If I don’t list, I forget stuff or get distracted by non-essentials (like reading that blog of other people’s lists).

So to keep things under control, I find myself breaking things out into separate lists. Right now I have before me the packing list, the personal stuff to do list, and the business stuff to do list. Sometimes I start a list with something I’ve already done just so I can immediately cross something off the list. A good one to start with today would be “Wake up and start a list”.

Books, Travels

I finally got into the garden yesterday. I weeded the flower beds and planted the dahlia tubers and gladioli bulbs. Dave mended the fence, mowed the lawn and weedwacked everything else. The results are satisfying — the place looks pretty good. Just in time for us to leave.

As usual there is so much to do before a trip. Already I feel the squeeze of anxiety in my heart. Since this trip spans the payroll time period, I need to prepare everything in advance.

But I also enjoy travel. The actual travel days are a respite from ringing phones and everyday demands. I know that with cell phones and ubiquitous internet access, I don’t really have the same freedom from obligation that the absence of technology used to impose, but I give myself permission to knock off a little anyway.

I usually select a new book for a trip. This time I’ll be traveling with Queen Noor of Jordan. I’ve always been curious about Lisa Halaby, an American woman who just happened to marry King Hussein in 1978. At the time it seemed unfathomable to me for a Princeton-educated woman to make such a choice. But I used to know a lot more than I know now.

Queen Noor’s book is my 16th since January. I doubt I’ll keep up this pace, but it’s been nice giving myself permission to read. Okay so there’s a lot more dog hair not getting swept up, but it’s a small price to pay.