It took 6 hours to fly back the distance that took me three months to drive. Admittedly, in my unhurried pace in the Jamboree with a lot of side trips.
I am not a jaded frequent flyer. I can't say that I hate it, am sick of it, nor that it causes me to pull my hair out. I love how easy it is to board in one place and mere hours later arrive in a totally different place. Fast and romantic. And that a glass of wine while travelling is not generally frowned upon gives it my vote.
But what is missed in the air is all the stuff in between those places.
I took a lot of family road trips growing up, most often between Calgary and Vancouver; you know the kind where the kids are in the way back of the stationwagon, playing and wondering loudly if we were there yet. I took road trips when I was in university; we'd drive south out of Calgary and end up in Arizona to get chased through the desert by rattlesnakes, and once all the way into Mexico, just to be able to say that we did. I've taken European road trips, from Amsterdam to Croatia and back again, around Scandinavia, into Germany and France, and from them I can confirm that the Europeans really are, on the whole, much better drivers than North Americans. I even took a road trip around Hokkaido Island once, in Northern Japan, on the other side of both the car and the road.
I won't even begin to try to list the flights I've taken over the years.
Whether it is a jet barrelling through the air or a vehicle bumping along the road, spewing out my contribution to the diminishing air quality of our beloved planet, its the moving and travelling that keeps me doing it. Sit still? In one place? For always?? You're kidding, right?
But driving to and from work? Commuting by car? You're kidding, right? Shouldn't driving be fun? Shouldn't travelling be fun? Give me my bike any day to commute. To get around. To breath in that increasingly spewey air. But for as much as I love love love my bikes, none of them can get me from Calgary to DC, for example, within a day.
I am apparently wondering about my carbon footprint, as they call it. And I don't love it. And so you see my ongoing dilemma.
A week ago, I parked the Jamboree at Dulles airport and wished it a safe rest, and then scampered onto a flight to Calgary through Toronto. This almost-week in Calgary was hectic as usual, me trying in vain to see everyone I wanted to in the 6 days I had there, waking up most mornings with the requisite fuzzy-head feeling from all the wine, and, this time, battling a cold (no, not that oogly-boogly one all over the news, I'm much better now, thank you). So now I find myself, once again, glad for those who I was able to see, and extending apologies out to those who I missed. But of course, you know, I will be back.
As I write, I gaze down at the lights over New York state from my seat in this Air Canada bullet zooming me back to DC; I can only wonder and hope that the Jamboree is still there, right where I left it, waiting for my return and all the stuff we'll discover in between places on the next leg of the road trip.
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| Calgary-Banff November 09 |
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