Much Unseen is Also Here*

Welp, our intrepid girl is off in the world again! Mark and I drove up to Max's cabin in the woods on Friday to pick her up and deliver her to the airport. We stayed overnight and were fed delicious grilled portobello mushroom sandwiches before we fell asleep listening to the quiet dark and the peepers on the lake. I've been missing nature lately, so that was nice. The next morning after coffee with goat milk and sweet goodbyes, we drove through the Catskills (beautiful) and then through downtown Newark (not so beautiful--and I'm still not sure about those directions).

Note her India brown hair!

Oh, Newark Airport. You are weird and old-feeling, and plus, it turns out Air India pilots are on strike and her flight was cancelled. The entire process would have made me crazy if I were on my own, but Mark and Zoë kept their cool.

At JFK, there were hours of standing in a line with several big Indian families, waiting for the one guy behind the Qatar Air counter who could help the passengers holding their "Flight Interruption Manifest" papers. Below, a stressed me pretending not to be stressed and an excited-and-a-little-nervous-but-relaxed Zoë, who said, "It's just like India!"

Oh, and I should have added that the change of flights, and change of airports, gave us time to drive into the city, eat falafel, walk the High Line, drink iced coffee, eat popsicles, and just be with our girl for a few extra bonus hours. I kept telling her that it would be less abrupt to go from New York to Mumbai than directly from Max's lake to Mumbai, and she kept emphasizing that New York in no way compares to Mumbai, and that there's no way to prepare for India. And she knows what she's talking about. Still, I think I'm right, at least a little bit.

So, she's off, and she's since arrived safely, my girl. She is so brave and has such an adventurous spirit. I've never met anyone quite like her.


*from "Song of the Open Road," by Walt Whitman