Okay. I’m back in Chicago. I was supposed to arrive here last night, around nine o’clock, but my flight got cancelled, and I ended up staying overnight in the airport in Providence, Rhode Island. I couldn’t sleep, and was bored, and jotted down the following in my sketchbook/journal thing while I waited to eventually board my flight.

This might be long and rambling. But there are CAMERA PHOTOS!

In Providence, it’s still snowing. After over three hours of sitting on a plan on the frozen runway, my flight back to Chicago was cancelled, and for the first time ever, I’m staying overnight in an airport. The whole damned building’s closed, save for the baggage claim, so I can’t even spend my hours leafing through bags of trail mix and Twizzlers in the gift shop, or counting the unsold hardcover copies of The DaVinci Code in the bookstore.

Nope. I, along with dozens of other stranded would-be air travelers, am biding my time, squatting amid the baggage claim carousels.

I’ve just supped on a lovely dinner of beef jerky, cheese fries, and Diet Mountain Dew, courtesy of the ground floor vending machine. I have an apple in my bag, an aperitif, if you will. I’ll eat that soon, to stave off any excess intestinal binding that my “meal” might cause.

I’ll be fine. This night might be interesting, despite my aversion to being forced to “while away the hours.” To be honest, there’s a strange sense of freedom in this grey limbo with its ugly carpeting and metallic lights. I just stepped outside for a cigarette, and the night, with its foreground of swirling snowflakes and background of stagnant neon highway, seemed so vast. I feel safe.

Sleep doesn’t seem likely tonight, so I might be awake to enjoy the first sunrise I’ve seen in some time.

Meanwhile, I have some books, some music, my sketchpad, and, by some twisted act of Providence (ha), I was able to will a really good pen to regurgitate from within the stanky belly of my well-loved carry-on.

About an hour ago, I called my friend, Meagan, who’s out in L.A. We joked about the how much an airport layover resembles a combination of Purgatory and limbo.

Oh, man, how accurate that is.

There is nothing to do, and nothing to commit to … not even discomfort. The atmosphere is only borderline ugly, completely inoffensive but depressingly uninspiring, and me and the rest of the lost souls in baggage claim are left to fritter around in semi-companionable near-despondency. Airports are recycled oxygen and canned comfort, and I hate them.

A woman, about thirty yards from me, is sitting on the carpet, reading a magazine, and stroking her complacent Yorkshire terrier. The pet carrier is by her side.

A whole mess of kids by carousel #1 are bemoaning the fact that they’ve lost a full day of skiing, wherever they were headed off to. They make the best of the situation, gossiping amongst themselves and cuddling in their parkas.

Most people have scurried out to the parking lot, to catch cabs or shuttles to the nearby Days Inn; but the roads are a stew of ice and wreckage, and driving is slow and treacherous. It’s a mixture of caution, poverty, and curiosity that keep me where I am.

Yes, this is very much the way I’d imagine limbo or Purgatory.

The concept of limbo holds a dreary fascination for me. In the non-secular, Dante sense, it seems like such a petty mish-mosh of divine bureaucracy. I remember reading about the second circle of hell in Dante’s The Divine Comedy, in which souls sent to Purgatory due to acts of lust are continually buffeted by gusts of wind, and are left to fly about like crazy, moaning, incandescent bats, condemned to fruitlessly search for reciprocation for their forbidden loves.

I remember that one of the souls was named Francesca.

[Ed. Note: I found this passage tonight, once I got home, from The Divine Comedy, Canto V. Skip to where the italics end if this shit bores or annoys you:

These are the words of Francesca, to Dante’s Pilgrim, when he asked her what caused her “downfall” …

“… ‘ There is no greater sorrow than thinking back upon a happy time in misery – and his your teacher knows. Yet if you long so much to understand the first root of our love, then I shall tell my tale to you as one who weeps and speaks.

One day, to pass the time away, we [Francesca and her lover] read of Lancelot – how love had overcome him.

We were alone, and we suspected nothing. And time and time again that reading led our eyes to to meet, and made our faces pale, and yet one point alone, defeated us.

When we had read how the desired smile was kissed by one who was so true a lover, this one, who never shall be passed from me, while all his body trembled, kissed my mouth.

A Gallehault indeed, that book and he who wrote it, too; that day we read no more.’ ”

Ha-cha-cha.

But, how sad. And, Purgatory? What bullshit.

I don’t know. I think that if I were in that position, I’d find some comfort in knowing that my lover and I shared the same fate. But (a) I bet there’s some sort of brainwashing that souls are subjected to before being tossed into Purgatory, to avoid their finding any solace in the “beat the system” loopholes, and (b) that’s totally not the point, I guess.

Whatever. If there’s an afterlife, which I don’t know if I believe, I imagine it to be less like Dante’s The Divine Comedy, and more like the administrative chaos depicted in “Beetlejuice.”

Like the customs office. Or hospitals. Or this fucking airport.

STUFF:

1. I’m so damned glad I stole those double-A batteries from my cousin when I saw her. My portable CD-player is low on fuel.

2. Snow is mighty pretty from afar. From awayawayfar. Far, like you’re on a beach in Maui, looking at postcards from Aspen. That far.

3. I’m not tired at all, but my ass is asleep. I need to find cushions.

4. One of the caveats of traveling solo, is that you have no one to talk to if your flight gets cancelled.

5. While waiting in an airport might qualify as limbo or purgatory, working in an airport is surely hell.

I’ve been wandering around, taking pictures of people with my camera phone. Poor folks, all fetused up. They look like sad little pollywogs.

Strangers engaged in a slumber party.

More of the same.

The resolution and contrast doesn’t really let you see, but here are two lovers with legs entwined.

Making do. I saw her wandering around later; she never really fell asleep.

I have a hunch that this guy has already has his share of airport overnights.

Covered like a cadaver.

BUTT!

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3:26 AM

My empty belly is a lot warmer now, thanks to Ryan, a young man I met outside by the ashtrays. He should be in Philadelphia right now, the same way I should be in Chicago.

Apparently, he befriended a flight attendant while his plane was stalled, not far from mine, at the time, on the runway. He came away with several baby-sized bags of pretzels, and baby-sized bottles of scotch. I have a bag of pretzels in my pocket now, and a bit of scotch in my gut.

I was outside talking with him and another stranger, “Mike.” The conversation was brief, because Ryan was wasted and Mike wished he was, but it was nice to have a bit of company (and booze) for a while.

Ryan told me that he plans to quit smoking on the New Year. (Don’t we all.) He said he’d quit last year, and only started up again a couple of months ago, after his girlfriend left him.

“So I had a smoke. Then I had another one. Because I have no girlfriend,” he said, and took another drag and another swig.

Jesus. So it goes.

Mike’s in a band. Here’s a picture of them, with Mike on the left, and Ryan on the right:

Did I have to tell you that Mike was in a band? Look at him.

Nice guys.

Here’s to solidarity in forced boredom.

I’m on a plane. It’s true!

The time is exactly twelve hours after my intended departure.

From my window seat, right behind the wing, I can see the snowplows begrudgingly shoving the snow from the runway to an ever-growing drift. My heart goes out for the drivers of the plows, who want to be home as much as I do, but goddamn if this plane doesn’t take off as scheduled.

I’m ending the sentence there, because I’m too mush-brained to imagine what course of action I’d take, if.

Yeah, too tired to keep.

I’m.

Sentences.

Blah.

I’ve finally landed at Midway Airport, in Chicago.

Four things in my near future:

1. Shower.

2. Glorious, glorious dump.

3. Nap.

4. Take-out.

I’m home. The items on my to-do list have been fulfilled. Why am I still awake?

G’night.

~ Last Five Entries ~

Arm-in-Arm Down Burgundy - 09.05.05

Motivated! - 08.25.05

Moths, and Relative Nonsense - 08.18.05

I Finally Have Internet Access in my Bedroom. But, No Ashtray. - 08.09.05

Here I Am - 08.02.05

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BUY JEN'S BOOK! BUY IT! DO IT!

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BUY DEAN'S BOOK, TOO! YOU KNOW YOU WANNA! SERIOUSLY.

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