weight

I travel from far places with lots of things, back to you.

The airline tells me I have brought too much stuff. The man eyes my three bags with a bored eye. I am meant to feel some kind of shame, I think. Who said 23 kg was the appropriate amount of stuff to bring wherever you go, for however long, for whatever reason? I think of the things in my bags - the book of poetry you got me, heavy and hardcover. 3 framed paintings from my grandparents house. A dress I have sewn myself. Two bottles of wine I tried and wanted you to try too. I think of these things and I rebel against the shame I am meant to feel.

My rebellion costs me 120 dollars.

Walking through security, my carry-on bag gets flagged as potentially dangerous. I wait a long time until they can double check. It takes a long time because there is an old woman, someone’s mother, grandmother, great-grandmother, with lots of stuff too. They have it all opened, all her bags, her things spread across the metal table. I have an instinct to look at what she has deemed important to bring across the world with her but it feels too perverse. Instead I watch her. Despite the perversity, she feels no shame. She is not apologetic for all her stuff, for making us all wait. Is that what age does to you?

She doesn’t speak English. Or French. Or Arabic. Or whatever other language someone working at the airport here might speak. I think it’s Greek. Two men, they could be her sons or her grandsons, but they are not, I can tell. There is a certain reservedness in the way they look at her, as well as a patience that no one holds for someone who is family. They speak Greek too and they are translating everything.

The officer holds a jar of Nutella up. It is the largest jar of Nutella I have ever seen. It might weigh 23kg alone. The possibly-greek son-not-son turns to the woman and speaks slowly to her in her language. She nods, listening. She is in no rush. She speaks slowly back to them. The son-not-son nods and turns back to the officer, gesturing to the Nutella.

“Can someone come and pick this up?”

They agree, the officer and the son-not-son that this is possible and will be arranged. They are formal about this arrangement. The passing of the Nutella is a serious matter.

The woman is holding a paper in hand. There are many things written on it in pencil and she points to a large scrawled phone number. The son-not-son dials the number she has pointed to and then holds the phone against her ear tenderly. She speaks for a moment and then turns her head away from it, pointing slowly to the man who’s phone it is. He speaks to the stranger on the phone and finishes the arrangement for her.

They are still there as my bag gets cleared as non dangerous. Still waiting for someone to pick up the Nutella.

I peruse overpriced books and debate my last chance at buying snacks. My final choice is a bag of salted chips and a magazine.

The woman paying in front of me produces a pregnancy test. She is stone faced and impenetrable as she places it on the counter. There is a slight carelessness in the way she puts it down, as if she is trying to prove she doesn’t care. She glances down at the chocolate bars and then puts a Kit Kat on the counter too. I wonder if she’s going to eat it before or after she takes the test.

I am amazed, firstly because I didn’t know it was possible to buy a pregnancy test here. Secondly, because I’ve never considered having something so destabilizing occur while you’re not touching the ground. I try to slip through her guard and into her mind to consider the possibilities. She wants the baby or she doesn’t. She will find out before she gets on the plane or after. Or. During the flight. That seems the most unsafe option. Up there you are as unreachable to the world as she is to me in this moment.

She pays with card and puts the test in her bag without looking twice. The Kit Kat she breaks open before she has even left the store. That answers at least one question.

I pay for my snack. She is sitting at a table around the corner eating her chocolate blankly. Her mouth is devouring the chocolate while the rest of her is still. She’s eating it the wrong way too, with no care for breaking off the pieces, just taking giant bites. I feel this information might give me a clue into the relationship between her and the pregnancy test that is in her purse but I can’t figure it out.

I board my flight and sit in seat 33A. The plane rebels gravity like it weighs nothing. I know for a fact this is not true, as I look around the sea of humans. It is all of us plus the 23kg we are allotted plus the extra 120 dollars of kilograms plus all the metal boxes of things we are going to ingest up there, plus the things that will keep us safe, apparently, plus..

While I’m above the clouds, everything is lighter.

I’m not a pessimist by nature but something happens up there. Things get all topsy turvy. Life feels closer and farther all at once. Up here, I could be anything. I feel closer to death. I am comparatively only millimetres closer to the sun but the closer you get to the vastness of the sky the closer you get to death. Millimetres closer to accepting it. It can be a poignant experience, sitting in that cylinder room of strangers. I marvel at the fact that I don’t know these people and we are nowhere and we are together.

I can’t ever do anything useful on a plane. Instead I do things like think of a hundred ways to start a book and finish none of them. I think of all the ways you could die and you don’t. I think of the difference between me and the people who mean anything.

I think of the conversation the last time we were on a plane together. The last time we were going somewhere together, instead of leaving each other. You asked me if the plane is lighter when it lands because we’ve eaten and drank all the food and drinks. How fast do we metabolize food? On this flight I eat my bag of chips, a wine, most of the mediocre chicken and potatoes dish, a few mini cookies, and at least 2 litres of water. I imagine all this food in a bag, carrying the weight around. Then I imagine it in my stomach, same weight. There is a difference between the weight I carry in my bag and the weight that’s inside me. One I can put down when it’s too heavy.

I read my magazine. Up here, despite all its poeticism, is the only place I indulge in this kind of frivolity. There’s a nostalgia, like I’m on a holiday, like I’m 16 reading my sister’s Cosmo. This far away from everyone, the farthest I can get in this lifetime, I hold onto the magazine of strangers like a lifeline.

We land and I’m still alive. It seems to me a miracle, every time. The clouds are above me once again and my feet are on the ground. The poetry is gone. We are all bleary-eyed and greasy-haired and just that tiny bit farther away from the sun.

I leave my magazine behind on the plane. A text comes in that you are waiting for me on the other side of that door. We all stand around and wait for our bags, the last wait of the journey, which always seems the longest.

Tonight I will unpack my three bags and we will drink the wine I brought. Maybe we’ll set up the paintings in our living room. I will tell you about the maybe-pregnant woman and the greek son-not-son. Maybe I’ll add Nutella to our grocery list. I will feel lighter, even though the clouds are above me.

I will make sure to marvel at the fact that I know you and we are somewhere and we are together.