Anticipation

I look at suitcases spread open on the big guest bed. I look at the piles of blue jeans and shirts and socks and sweaters for layering and sigh. I am out of practice at this.

Since we bought Sanctuary, all of our trips have been between there and San Diego, our car loaded with a computer and sewing machine, a sturdy bag that serves as my portable office, and all the things that we need in both locations for work and living, including two cats and their paraphernalia. I have developed a high-tech system for these trips, involving a pile of miscellaneous items in a corner of our bedroom that increases in size in anticipation of each trip. As I think of things that need to travel with us to one house or the other, it goes on the pile. When travel day comes, these items are transferred to whatever vehicle we will be using and voila! Off we go.

This trip is different. Six months ago I received an email from a good friend inviting us to attend his wedding. In Germany. This will not be a throw-everything-in-the-car-and-close-the doors kind of trip. No, this one requires a different skill set.

So I look at all our mismatched luggage and nearly despair. National Asset looks at me but says nothing. His pile will most likely fit in a carry-on. A small carry-on.

Of course, one of the large bags to be checked is filled with our wedding gift, a handmade quilt stitched with love for the bride and groom. So on our return flight that bag will be available for overflow and whatever will return with us from Europe. But this knowledge provides no help to me now.

This will be my first trip over the pond. Our daughter accompanied her dad on a work trip when she was still in high school. She was delighted to be missing anatomy and English and visiting Europe's fine museums and art galleries. I remember discussing the trip with the school administrator. 

"I'm afraid this will be an unexcused absence since she has used up most of her sick days," she says.

"What does unexcused mean?" I ask. "Will this affect her graduation somehow?"

"No," she replies.

"You do understand that she will be attending art college in the fall, and this is an opportunity for her to visit some of the best museums in the world, right?"

"It is still unexcused," she says.

"Well, what are the consequences of being unexcused?" I ask.

"It will go on her permanent record," she replies.

"Oh, okay. Well I am her mother and I give permission for my daughter to go on this trip even though it will be unexcused."

Our son went to Europe with his dad more recently. They share an interest in family genealogy. Their trip included hours, maybe even days, doing research in places housing archives, and locating the sites where our ancestors lived and worked and worshiped.

Finally, it is my turn. I have made the Asset promise that I won't have to visit with the distant relative who delights in showing off his amazingly large collection of cattle semen. There are so many other things that I've read about and seen pictures of that I would like to visit. I detected something that felt a bit like resistance, but he agreed. As I said, it is my turn now.

I just have to get there.

I remind myself that I survived two trips to Australia with not only a serious time difference to overcome, but a change of season as well. On one of those the Asset left me behind for two additional nights (due to waiting too long to book my return) which involved flying from Sydney to Hawaii to Vancouver, Canada, in that middle seat in the middle aisle directly in front of the galley so the seat doesn't recline at all, with the passenger on my left coughing and the one on my right holding a puke bag and having to exit the plane and go through customs at each and every stop before landing in San Diego twenty-four hours later. 

This was my watershed trip. I do not like flying. I do not feel well when I am flying. I can't sleep while flying. But, I figure if I survived that nightmare trip from Australia, I can do this.

Europe, here I come.