Thursday, September 27, 2007

Departure



I had started planning my off season escape months ago, feeling the need to travel to places I had never been instead of merely returning to Italy's lure. I already had a sherpa in mind for the Himalayan trek but with the upcoming November Nepalese elections and the Maoist Separatists on edge, it seemed prudent to postpone and detour. I love southeast Asia and could have easily returned to Thailand for dental work, shopping, endless massage and the amazing curry. Turkey was out of the question for the same reason as was Morocco with the recent bombings. Greece was burning.

Italy kept calling... more like singing actually... the food, the culture, the museums and my roots. Before moving back to Crested Butte 3 years ago, I had determined that I would feel quite at home living in Rome, breezing the maize of streets on a little Vespa with endless access to fabulous leather boots. Although I will never regret the decision to move back to the Butte, I was having chronic cravings for sheep cheeses and Fellini movies.

It's not easy or cheap to get to anywhere from Crested Butte, nor is it easy to leave when you already live in Paradise. Who wants to miss a powder day in the winter? Spring is townie take-over season and the opportunity to catch up with friends. Can't leave in the summer, it's too gorgeous. And Autumn is just a spectacularly golden time. It's just good fortune that I lucked into two jobs that afford me the opportunity to leave for both off seasons, fall and spring. Not that I'm swimming in the Butte big bucks, but since both of my jobs close down for off-seasons I may as well take advantage of the situation and leave town with the rest of the herd.

The first leg of the trip had to start with the obligatory semi-annual visit to my least favorite locale: Florida. With Italian guilt genetically part of my heritage, there was no way I was going to get away with flying to the Motherland without first visiting the family in Florida. I actually adore my family but just wish they didn't all live in the heat of the sprawl mall environment of blue hair traffic congestion. Fortunately, one of my brothers still lives on the white sands of Clearwater Beach, where we grew up as kids after the family migrated down from NY with the rest of the Bronx.

At the Gunnison County Airport they confiscated my hair conditioning – No More Tangles, used to smooth the hair of a generation of screaming kids when mom tried to comb the knots out of their wet locks.
“Are you traveling with children?” the security checker asked suspiciously as he examined the plastic baggie containing the bright pink spray bottle.
“Well... I AM the child,” I confessed.
“Sorry, this will have to go,” he authoritatively pronounced.
The little turbo-prop mountain hopper circled upwards into the perfect Gunnison Valley bluebird day, glowing with autumnal color – everyone onboard feeling so much safer knowing the skies were protected from strawberry scented hair detangler.

I had gotten one of those airline seating upgrades, the ones that are only good for 1000 miles of travel and with a short window of opportunity to use, which inevitably falls into the Crested Butte labor force's can't-leave-now time frame. However, this one was timed right and I could finally cash in on being able to have feeling in my legs at the end of the 3 and a half hour flight to the Sunshine State.
“I'd like to upgrade to first class,” I smugly handed the Denver airline attendant my coupon.
He chuckled and handed the slip back to me, as though he knew I never flew that category of elegance, “Lady, there is no first class on this flight. It's Ted. The economy plane.”
Ted, the fraction of United's fleet. The workhorse people mover. Only half a plane with as many seats crammed into a screaming metal no-frills fuselage.

There used to be a time when the airlines had thinking people working for them. People who understood order and the logic of loading people seated in the rear of the plane first so they wouldn't have to climb over those who were trying to shove their bags into overhead compartments in the front of the jet. But no more. Now they randomly assign you a seating group number and although my seat was in row 26, the very back tail section, my boarding pass noted I was in group 4... the last to load.

Mr. Chuckles took my ticket at the gate and set it on a pile, “So, you decided to fly anyway,” his jolly round smile was infectious, “and are you traveling alone?”
“Just me and the rest of the 179 passengers," my gaze drifted to the long line slowly worming its way up the ramp to the plane.
“Here you go... I think you'll like this better. In fact, you're gonna love this...” he winked and handed back a completely different boarding pass and seat assignment. I was now sitting 20 rows up from where I was supposed to be and in something called Economy Plus in a window seat. It was as spacious as a coveted exit row and I didn't have to agree to perform any heroic functions required of that seat of responsibility.

Surrounding me in this section were supersized people. My row mate was The Walrus... and he was macking out on a Mickey D's enormous whopper triple decker and a pound box of fries. He was spread across 2 full seats blocking my access to the aisle and I figured I wouldn't be able to get out of my window seat for quite awhile so it seemed as good a time as any to catch up on lost snoozing. When I came out of the serious drool of deep sleep, we were landing over Tampa Bay. The sunset was about to give its spectacular show over the orange reflecting gulf waters. Outside, the thick air was waiting to slam me with a wall of hot humidity.
“Ahhhh,” I breathed it all deeply into my work weary self, “this is going to be the start of a fabulous adventure...”