On Flying

I wrote the following in my journal on April 1st, 2010, while flying from Santa Cruz, Bolivia to Buenos Aires, Argentina. I offer no other commentary, well, here: I think it's neat.

How wondrous to watch the shadow of one's own airplane slip across the fields and homes below. How can I guess what effect has this darkening? Were it slow enough, would a dog chase it, staying always in this cool patch I cast down from above and arriving finally and inadvertently in my same destination?

A glass Coke bottle from above: the gods must be crazy. A metal tube thrown by faith and ultimately magic into the sky, to cast its shadow out over the land and lost in the clouds: the passengers must be crazy.

And crazy we are not to rejoice and exult: we are strung up in the heavens, delicately balanced by the shape of a wing and the thrust of an engine. I am but a feeble man but set my wallet to vibrating and the gods of the sky accept me as their own. I fly.

I fly to Buenos Aires, to Argentina and away from Bolivia. Would that I could make this journey within the warm savory crust and stew of a salteña. A final goodbye to this fair and complex land.

But my airplane invokes the magic of metal and light and wind, not of whimsy and spice. Truly, I am an airborne god but surely they will serve me only a middling sandwich. Better they should light a grill in the mess and char a red bloody Argentinian cut. Bring me a glass of Malbec, steward, and some llaqwa for my steak.

In the face of everyday wonder, how impossible becomes the everyday. Yes, we will glide over the spine of this continent, but no, we cannot offer passable fare. I should calm my stomach and mind, awaiting whatever culinary offerings that come.

Forgive me and understand only that I tire in this station as a god and that already I feel the ache of absence of Bolivian soup and meat and rice and potatoes and llaqwa. I tire, indeed, every day in contemplation of and immersion in a decidedly unordinary life.

I never wanted to be a god. I never dreamed of this but instead a warm home, a place that smelled like forever, and a dog to follow my shadow and a partner in whose arms I could soar to the heavens and return to earth every day, every moment.

Better I should be a man eating soup at home than a god lost upon every wind and shore. Homeward, wherever that may be, but not quite yet.