On Tuesday, we flipped into travel mode. Tina’s sister, Debra, came up by the train to Alexandria with Jun Jun. They are watching the animals, so no worries. Queena and Sarah arrived shortly afterwards. We mentally prepared to make the trip to Dulles where British Air would take care of the rest of the travel leg over the Atlantic Ocean to London, and Glasgow. Every step to this point went without a hitch, unless you count the moment where Google Maps was thwarted by an incoming phone call right about the time Queena was negotiating a direction change. But compensate we did, eventually parking at Dulles and making our way to the checkin with British Air.
It has been a long while since I have been in the Dulles International Terminal. I think 1972, when a group of us from Lynchburg flew down to Miami to the Republican National Convention out of Dulles. That was a flight when the pilot mentioned the construction of Disney World in Orlando when we flew over the soon to be obliterated dark spot at night, known then only as Central Florida
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Progress, tight security, and air travel as a regular mode of transportation has transformed the whole experience. Waiting to board, Tina and I ate Italian, Queena and Sarah made their way to Five Guys for burgers and fries. We waited to board the plane. We met a couple from Pittsburgh on our same flight heading to Africa. The waiting area at Gate 44 filed up with a number of people, including a younger man in red shorts, dred head and wearing a top-hat. Sarah and I planked, she for 5 minutes and me for 3.
When the announcement to board the plane was given, we lined up in the various queues according to ticket status. First Class passengers were boarded into their respective cubicles, the rest of us, Economy Passengers, were lined up and filed into the rest of the plane and into our seats accordingly. The rows of seats in three groups of three lined all the way to the rear. Normal sites for frequent travelers but still amazing for those like me who managed to keep away from this mode of traveling for at least six years.
A wide eye moment for me, as I noted in these cramp quarters with Tina beside me, Queena and Sarah in the adjacent seats across the isle, a small touch screen and access to in-flight entertainment located on the back of the headrest directly in front of me.
Everyone was seated and mentally preparing for the takeoff as the plane began to taxi toward the runway. The plane slowed and stopped, after a few minutes the pilot announced a delay as the flight information was not downloading into the flight controls as expected. A portent of things to come, but we were ignorant of any issues. We remained patiently on the tarmac waiting for runway access for nearly an hour, before the plane began to make it’s way into takeoff position. The pilot assured us we would make up time when in the air so as not to be too delayed at our first stop in London. Soon the taxiing aircraft was acquiring accelerating speed, moving down the runway in the dark. Eventually we felt the rise of the nose and the wheels leaving the ground below us as the plane lifted off into the night sky. From the window view we could see the lights of Northern Virginia, the District, and the surrounding areas receed into a quilt of lights linked by tiny threads linking the cities below.
I watched the screen in front of me indicating the location of our flight over a map display. In the corner of the screen an information window indicated airspeed, altitude, and estimated arrival time in London Heathrow; 11:35. Our connecting flight was scheduled to depart for Glasgow at 11:50. A slight concern that I made no mention of, trusting the pilot’s reassurance that we would make up for any delay in the take-off time.
Window shades had been drawn shortly after takeoff at the instructions of the flight attendants, so we were isolated from any note of the minus 70 degree world at 36,000 feet, nearer to space than to the nurturing environment of our life nurturing mother. Many slept restlessly as I did, our takeoff was just before midnight. Food and refreshment carts were rolled up the aisles between the seats offering wine, soda, or water along with snacks. Later on the flight attendant offered us a hot meal of vegetarian or chicken served in an aluminum dish with plastic forks. A feast for 200 at the table hurling at around six hundred miles per hour skipping over the limits of the atmospheric edges of the planet. This dreamlike experience replaying scenes from Kubrick’s space odessy and fueled by a slight buzz from party bottles of gin, whiskey, and wine. Partying passengers counting on the designated pilot to get us to the curb of our destination by morning.
After what seemed like days sitting in one upright position, I caught a line of light coming through the window at the bottom of the shade. We had caught the dawn playing chicken with the rising sun. Like Charles Lindberg’s 1927 flight across the Atlantic, except we had traveled six times his speed. This was the stuff of his dreams and countless others whose shoulders the travel industry was built on.
The flight attendants instructed the bleary eyed passengers to open the drawn window shades, revealing the coast of England as we made our approach to Heathrow and the mess that we were yet to find under the tree of gifts.