The Airport
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Thursday 03:57 ⸺ Finally, an excuse to use the long hyphen character. That is not the real name of the character comprising three hyphens, but I cannot recall the name. I should have no excuse: this very topic was a matter of discussion 10 days ago. Nevertheless!
Airports are interesting between places. The place you go to get to another place. I have never been to an airport as early. The energy here this morning is quite different to that with which I am acquainted. It is sleepy. A few people look a bit awake, but for the most part there feels to be a collective tiredness among us. It is early. No departure gates have opened yet.
There is quiet, but I have chosen to listen to music. For regular readers, my saying I am listening to music by Taylor Swift should come as no surprise. One thing about which I am surprised is that iOS doesn’t do a good job of autocorrecting Ms. Swift’s last name. I wish I could submit a Pull Request.
More people are arriving, although few and far between. Maroon echoes in my ear, a song I have heard on two continents.
My eyes are heavy, but I am curious about the environment. The relative peace in what is normally a busy place.
04:19: I shall have to research the proper grammar for a time stamped piece of writing.
It is the job of the writer to capture moments, emotions, information; to build stories. Varying by in what type of writing one is interested. I stood up to explore the airport and found the other side had open shops: eateries, and, importantly, coffee.
A man was sleeping, who later woke up, donned his glasses, and moved on. People are eating breakfast. Drinking hot beverages. A young man has sat next to me and is now eating his breakfast.
While waiting in airports, the mundane becomes interesting.
“I love people watching”, proclaims the woman seated behind me. She has a British accent.
A woman with a blue hat stares at her phone, then rests her head on her backpack. This reminds me of the tiredness I am experiencing. I haven’t finished my coffee yet.
I am tempted to move somewhere quieter but I like the activity. It feels like the world has woken up a bit more.
04:26: The coffee I am drinking made me recall a memory of walking down the Embarcadero in San Francisco in the early morning. Around 7:00am. I loved watching the Bay. On vacation, I like exploring early. To see the world before most are awake; out and about.
There is a sticker with a bear wearing glasses and a red and blue striped scarf, carrying a book, on the window in front of me.
There is one packed restaurant.
04:42: A woman walks swiftly by, holding a cup or coffee in one hand. The milk frothier from an espresso machine whirs in the background.
05:03: There is a sea of phones. This has me thinking about the Edinburgh 2050 Vision video I watched yesterday. In the video, a man remarked that they hope that more people will talk on the bus instead of looking at their phones.
What is the word for a feeling of loss for something that you never experienced? Is it normal to strike up a conversation with a stranger in, say, a cafe for no reason? Why, or why not?
More people are arriving at the gate to which I made my way 15 minutes ago.
I like serendipitous conversations. I spoke with a man from Tennessee in an elevator. There was nothing of particular note about the conversation, but there needn’t be. The presence of a conversation was a pleasure unto itself.
Technical question: I wonder how one finds common expressions in a corpus of text.
My mind likes to wander.
The soft piano in the song Champagne Problems sounds through my ears.
I like smaller airports.
Two people sitting in different areas sip coffee simultaneously. A man with headphones over his head, wearing colorful Nike shoes, reads a book.
05:15: A man wearing a Buxton t-shirt walks past. In the foreground, a bottle of Buxton water rests in a table. I wonder if the man’s shirt is about the water company, or something else entirely. I smile.
05:50: Enters the depths of the anxious mind. I know I could be in the fast queue for boarding but I didn’t enter that queue. I can’t move to the other line now. Too many people. That’s how anxiety feels: sometimes, seemingly normal activities occupy my mind more than they should. This is me.
06:37: Preparing for takeoff. Taxiing is a word with two “i”s in sequence.
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