This week I am thankful for the ground. Or, more specifically, I am thankful to be on the ground. And for home. I am so, so thankful to be home.
I am a homebody, that much is true. And, as I learned from the personality assessment I completed at the work retreat from which I just returned, I am a solid introvert. Actually, that’s not true. Well, I am an introvert. But I didn’t just discover that. I was already well aware of that tidbit about myself. The fact that I find an excuse to turn down 99% of the invitations I receive was a pretty good clue.
I mean, people are exhausting. I love them, I do, but I can only handle so much of them. I can deal with them one-on-one. Or I can deal with them in short bursts. Or I can barely/almost/hardly/sort of/maybe handle 188 of my colleagues for two days, after which I must rush home and immediately bury my head.
When you couple all of the people-ness with air travel, you basically have my worst nightmare. I am not a good flyer. In fact, I am always slightly shocked to be alive when the plane lands. I have thought about asking for a Valium prescription for use when flying. But I hesitate. We all travel for a purpose, right? For me, I am usually taking my kids on vacation or heading to a professional conference. Either way, I can’t exactly show up in a drug-induced haze, and I just don’t know how the sedative would affect me. So I guess irrational fear is preferable. Of course, I try to camouflage this fear from my colleagues, and certainly from my kids. I don’t want to pass on my peccadilloes. Even though I doubt my fellow lawyers would be susceptible to my phobia, I know my kids would be.
I haven’t always been this way. I remember flying as an unaccompanied minor back when I was 9, on my merry way to visit a friend. Flying didn’t bother me at all back then. Heck, skydiving wouldn’t have bothered me back then. But I think, as we get older, we understand that the stakes are higher. And so we harbor more fears. It’s only because we recognize what we have to lose. Or, more accurately, we recognize those who would be lost without us.
I think my fear stems from something else, though. I noticed that I became a far more tense flier after 9/11/01.
We all have a personal September 11 story. I had just moved to NYC to attend law school three weeks previously. I was a newbie. And for me, that date is forever tied to black ash accumulating on the wall of my dorm room until I came to my senses enough to close the window. Wearing a disposable face mask on my walk to the bodega to stock up on water. Standing on the roof of my building and watching the towers fall to the ground. I never knew what normal was for Manhattan. Really, it never had a chance for me. My new home was an ashy ghost town until they reopened Manhattan below 14th Street and classes resumed. I think it was over a week later, maybe two.
Like I said, anyone could tell you where they were on the morning of September 11. Just as anyone from my generation could pinpoint their location when the Challenger exploded. For others, it’s the assassination of JFK. Pick your tragedy. I don’t mean to sound callous at all, but I wonder: Why don’t we remember where we were when the good things happen? Our minds always fixate on the horrific.
But this. This was the worst terror attack in American history. And it doesn’t belong to me. It belongs to those nearly 3,000 people who lost their lives. The workers. The first responders. I remember when the city was wallpapered with photographs of the people missing in the wake of September 11. And I remember the dawning of absolute horror as we came to understand that we had stood in line to give blood for no reason. Because none of those people were missing. They weren’t going to show up in need of blood. They were gone. Just…gone.
I have friends who can’t look at the footage from that day. And I have friends who couldn’t look away. Either way, we were all affected.
I, apparently, came away with a brand new fear of flying. And it sucks. It sucks to want to go on spring break with your kids but to dread the vacation as it approaches. It sucks to grip the armrests in terror at the first sign of turbulence. Especially when your sweet hubby can’t be there to distract you with a calming squeeze of his hand.
But (of course there is a “but,” because this is where I come to be grateful, after all), I came home to said husband. And to my two sweet babies. And our two darling pups. Plus two borderline-neglected goldfish who have still managed to hang on, against all odds. I love them all, perhaps even more so after I have been gone, if that is possible.
And, for a super-extra-special bonus, no one beyond that is around. Ahhh. Be still, my little introverted heart.
