1 Flights to Miami 2026

The Uber driver came early and I actually got in the car before Michael did. Usually Michael’s always waiting on me. The Uber driver was a black guy a big guy and seemed a very nice guy. But even before I got to his car it sounded like he was talking on the phone with somebody--there were voices coming from his car. Maybe he was listening to a podcast, I don’t know. But it did make me think that it was a little unkind to my neighbors who he was parked in front of their house that it was so loud. It was 4 o’clock in the morning after all and it’s a pretty quiet neighborhood besides raccoons shrieking like they did last night or robins chirping loudly in the morning or dogs barking or chickens clucking. Now that I think of it there used to be a lot more musical instruments heard in our neighborhood, too. We have a bagpiper a block over, who I haven’t heard in a while. The neighbor with the chickens has a son and when he was a teenager we would hear him practicing the electric guitar in the garage, which was nice. There was even an opera singer for several years. But to hear people talking loudly in the street at 4 o’clock in the morning –I take that back as that happens too on our street. Well, even the other day early in the morning, during meditation, there was some woman outside yelling. We’re very close to downtown and right between warm Springs and fire gulch I think it’s called and memory Grove and downtown cell we get a lot of interesting traffic. When the weather is good, and when it’s in season I suppose, the nine at nine I think it’s called the bike ride that happens every Thursday night often comes down our street and it wakes us up in the middle of the night like having burning man partying going by. It’s really awesome. And when our bedroom was upstairs in the front room where my office is now when we used to sleep up here we could hear everything would hear the birds early in the morning and would hear fireworks at night if there were fireworks would hear the high school games happening when they were high school football games would hear the Thursday night bike riders go by for which and for the fireworks I jump out of bed and look out the window which was a lot of fun. But now we’re down in the basement and we hear nothing which is wonderful. But I still wake up at 1 o’clock in the morning, probably like farmers or prehistoric people did back in the old days. Did wake up at 1 o’clock and make sure the fire was put out or let the chickens roll in their pens or whatever. Nowadays lately I wake up right at 1 o’clock or right before 1 o’clock and I tend to stay awake for a while it seems thinking about what needs to be done or what needs to change or any worries I have. Sometimes I take to do list notes Down in the middle of the night trying not to wake Michael. Last night I remembered that I had left the umbrella that I had recently relocated up on an upper deck to shade a new table that I got a new place where I love having my morning coffee. At 1 o’clock in the morning I remembered that I have not retracted the umbrella. Usually it won’t be such a big deal but we’ve been having a lot of gusts very strong gusts lately. So I looked on my phone and I saw that it was gonna get a little gusty at night maybe 10 miles an hour, and I don’t know if that would’ve done anything, but it did make me think that I should get up and go put down the umbrella. So I did I got up and I threw some sweats over my pajamas and I stepped outside and I heard the most horrible screeching. It sounded like somebody was being killed. Seriously. It sounded like the chickens nearby were being slaughtered. It was horrific. And I walked towards the backyard and I got into our backyard and I realized that the sounds the screeches were not coming from the chickens but we’re coming from the north side probably a yard over maybe over and Laura’s yard or Rick and Kyoko’s yard and I realize that those bloodcurdling screams were probably from raccoons getting together. Anyway we usually don’t hear Conversations in cars sitting out in the street at 4 o’clock in the morning that’s my point. When I got to the car the driver turned off whatever he had been listening to or hung up the phone and he came around to help me with my bag which is always over the weight limit, by the way. I have recently realized that these nice big hardshell suitcases hold a lot of stuff. When I was a kid when I was in my 20s 30s even in my 40s before marrying Michael I traveled very very lightly. Usually I just take a carry-on even if I was traveling around the world for months if it couldn’t fit in a duffel bag it wasn’t going with me. But now with Michael, and with my huge suitcases, and with my different kind of travel ( more than that later  ) I really feel pressured to bring a variety of clothes. Way more than I’m gonna wear. But at least I have options. Anyway the Uber driver came over grabbed my bag and opened his back hatchback door which Orbison all of a sudden triggered loud loud rap like music. I mean if the talking earlier hadn’t woken up my neighbors I’m sure this would have. He quickly apologized and ran over to the driver side door and turned off the music and apologized profusely. He put my bag in the back and then he put Michael’s bag in which, I have to say, weigh the same as mine, 50 pounds. And then we got in the car and he turned on the most insipid banal easy listening music that we had ever heard. It was actually horrible and I asked him to just please turn on whatever he liked to listen to. And it was the first Uber ride of many. He was a nice guy. I don’t remember his name right now. He was from Uganda I think. He still had or Rwanda. Funny, it’s all coming back to me. I had recently before that trip been googling Madagascar and the island of Reunion. Because I read an article in Smithsonian magazine about vanilla and the history of vanilla. But I had even more recently like just before that trip and that ride, googled Zanzibar. Our sweaty pig coach Connor, and his fiancé Jenny, are going to Zanzibar. So of course I googled it to see how close it was to Madagascar and Zanzibar and what it would be like there I saw that it was right off the coast of Tanzania I think, and right above Tanzania is Wanda and Uganda. Uganda to me looks like a horse head it’s right around the northern coast of the lake Victoria. And I know this because a friend of mine has been there and has Friends there and has worked with orphans there and I’ve met one of the orphans at our house and she gave me a keychain that I think was made out of a slice of some animals horn and it was in the shape of Uganda and I had it for years I really loved it but I dropped it outside I think in the street and it got weathered and kind of fell apart so I had to throw it away. Anyway when the driver told me he was from that area what do I say? How’s your family doing there? That’s what I usually ask and I’m sure I asked him that too. And I’m sure he told me that he goes back and visits when he can probably once a year that’s what most people say. Anyway that was the first Uber ride to the airport.

We got in through security everything actually went quite easy I think Michael got patted down which is pretty funny. But this was a day that the day prior the TSA not being paid while ice agents are being paid, and all the shit around that, really had me a little concerned for all the people working there at security. Before getting to the airport I had read that somebody suggested bring into the TSA people gift cards you know for cash that they can buy food. I didn’t do that. But I did think of it anyway the poor dears. I’m such a curmudgeon. A real grump, especially lately. But I really do love people. That said I don’t like everybody, but I do love everybody. We went through security. Then I went to Starbucks because it’s my traveling ritual. I got a latte with oat milk for myself (in my yeti travel mug) and a double espresso from Michael. And then it was a short walk to the Delta lounge. Was the first time I’ve been an adult lounge in a while I think. Quite a bit of a hassle to actually get in but once you’re in it’s a "Safe place”. It was glaringly obvious to me that everybody in there was white, Caucasian, pasty and the truth Trump America sense of the word, with one or two people of Asian decent. And everybody that worked there was brown. That started making me a little uncomfortable. Think about ice and the fears that brown people must have these days. And, Little disc disclosure, I’ve always thought of myself as brown. I have always identified as brown. But I don’t look brown, and never have, no matter how hard I’ve tried.

As usual my flights consist of watching the movies that other people are watching over their shoulders, silent; and mostly just looking out the window taking photographs.