The airport/ air travel experience

5:21 A.M. --SALT LAKE CITY AIRPORT--

Things I have learned already:

1. When traveling with a laptop, you are supposed to take it out of your bag and put it in a tray with the rest of your miscellaneous items
2. 3:30 A.M. is REALLY early

6:25 A.M. --TAKEOFF AND FLIGHT--

We headed down the runway slow, maybe 30 MPH, and for a moment I wondered why we weren’t going faster. Then we made a wide turn onto the real runway and accelerated steadily until we were past freeway speed.

You can feel the moment the wheels leave the ground. It’s like an invisible hand pressing on your head, pushing you into your seat. You sit back and watch as the buildings below grow smaller until they’re nearly out of sight – when you’ve reached flying altitude.

Then you get to amuse yourself – by reading a book, or looking out the window like I am now. You marvel that something as big and cumbersome as this plane can be so light in the air. You’re sitting there, marveling at it all, when a flight attendant stops by your row and asks politely,

“Would you like something to drink?”

I guess only first-time fliers like me are so intensely interested in staring out at the clouds and sky, watching the sun come into place, suddenly, in the east behind the tail, enjoying this new perspective above mountains. Above the horizon.

Oh yes, I’m enjoying this view.