I have to pause here before I lose momentum for the thought/conversation I am having here on the couch amidst my dad reading the news on the opposite couch, my mom standing on, my brother and sister dispersed around the room/kitchen, all of us talking about the effects of the last handful of earthquakes. I just read on twitter that the Chilean quake cause the days to be shorter (probably by miliseconds, but still), and my dad just said that the quake also shook the earth's crust and caused a "sloshing" of Lake Pontchartrain (the lake separating the north shore- Mandeville, from the south shore-New Orleans). Unreal! And all these quakes are happening on different fault lines... I'm jus sayin'... I mean, I'm sure everyone else is saying the same thing, and probably their blogs are way more informed and interesting. So, I'll stop there. I just had to say SOMEthing :]
Anyhoo. My flight was this morning at 10:30. So, last night I drove up after work (around 9pm) to Arlington to stay with my sister for the night, so she could drop me off at Dulles on her way to work the next morning (this morning). But, she was really not feeling well to start, which I think was a clue into how the next 24 hours was going to go... That night, I tossed and turned more than I ever have before. I seriously can't remember the last time I had such trouble sleeping! I never had a problem falling asleep in her bed before, in fact, that night just before settling in I commented on how much I looked forward to snuggling with her comforter. But, for some reason, my pajama pants were ridiculously uncomfortable. And then I was so hungry my stomach was eating itself. And then my pillow seemed to sink lower than my feet so that my sinuses became a wall of steel smashed against every fiber of my face. I was snotting, I was drooling, I was trying to fix my pants, I was trying to have a dream that kept getting interrupted, I was working myself into a huge tizzy. Betsy mumbled something in her sleep. I tried not to laugh out loud, but it was something about "and what sound does a cat make?" Finally, I decided my face/pants/pillow situation was out of control and I needed to move to a couch downstairs so I could prop my head up on an armrest and hopefully get it back to the natural pH level or whatever the heck is going on in your head on any given day when you're not suffering from a wall of sinuses up at bat in your face. Ahem. Anyway, around 5am I went shivering down to the couch, turned off a lamp and pulled a couple of pillows around me for warmth. Sleep came and went. My neck hurt a lot. But, I awoke at the allotted time this morning and felt surprisingly rested. Miracle? Yes.
At the airport, people were peaceful. I thought to myself, ahhh, this is what the airport should be like always. But, it was only the begining...
Long story short, I guess my sinuses decided they were too rattled to recover enough to be peaceful themselves during my two flights to NO. So, my face literally felt like it was going to explode from the pressure in my ears and nose. I was almost in tears as the first leg of my flight landed. The next flight, I bought "earplanes" which are said to eliminate pressure in ears. I plugged my ears up to start the last leg of my flight and crossed my fingers as the plane took off. So uncomfortable. So painful! But, I managed to fall asleep for most of it, waking up intermittently to close my mouth and wipe the drool off my cheek. I spent the last 15 minutes of the flight pinching my nose closed because I was legitimately worried it would explode. So, needless to say I was quite the sight. Ears plugged, coming in and out of consciousness, rocking back and forth while holding my nose closed, eyes tightly shut. I could have kissed the ground when we landed. Fortunately, the New Orleans International Airport pavement doesn't show under the thick layer of gum and garbage covering the street, so that wasn't an option.
It was that much more special when I walked up to my house and toddling up to me to say hello were my cousin's little children, wispy red hair, smiley jelly faces, "mamey, hi mamey" tiny Maggie says. Now that I'm here, I'm here. I feel good, I feel great. It's like nothing bad can happen now that I'm home. Not for the next two weeks.
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