Colorado, Baby
Although the commencement of my air-traveling days was only 7 years ago, I have seen an incredible evolution of the airport even in that short time period. The airport, one of my favorite places to be, (because being there means I am going somewhere else), now sports in every imaginable corner the grand, illustrious Screen. Along with the traditional television screen that dismayingly shows that your Spring Break flight out to Cancún is delayed (thanks to a coconut that got lodged in the engine somewhere), and the news that flashes across other TV screens peppered throughout the terminals, there is now a tablet screen placed in front of every single feasible seat, excepting those that line the walls of the building. Displayed upon these screens are the words:
Eat.
Play.
Shop.
One simply sits down, punches in their flight number, swipes their card (or at least, this is what I imagined goes on, as I did not experience it for myself), and can make purchases, play games, or order food from the nearest restaurant. It is an almost dizzying sight to behold the sheer quantity of screens.
As if that is not enough, each person seated in front of these screens has their own personal device pulled out, usually taking place in between themselves and the person sitting next to them. The phone lodges a prominent spot between people, including enamored couples and flirtatious co-workers.
I am observing all of this while one of those gazillion screens fills up with the words:
President George H.W. Bush dies at age of 94.
My own little screen had been tucked away in my backpack, as I had resolved to not use it much during this voyage to Colorado, but I grabbed it out and sent off a quick message to the family text:
One simply sits down, punches in their flight number, swipes their card (or at least, this is what I imagined goes on, as I did not experience it for myself), and can make purchases, play games, or order food from the nearest restaurant. It is an almost dizzying sight to behold the sheer quantity of screens.
As if that is not enough, each person seated in front of these screens has their own personal device pulled out, usually taking place in between themselves and the person sitting next to them. The phone lodges a prominent spot between people, including enamored couples and flirtatious co-workers.
I am observing all of this while one of those gazillion screens fills up with the words:
President George H.W. Bush dies at age of 94.
My own little screen had been tucked away in my backpack, as I had resolved to not use it much during this voyage to Colorado, but I grabbed it out and sent off a quick message to the family text:
"President George H.W. Bush died at 94!"
I use the exclamation point not because I am happy, but because it is news, and it is something to be spread around with a sense of “wow”.
Zippering up the pocket where I re-enter my device, I sip some water and watch people while I wait till boarding time. There’s a happy-buzz simmering in my soul at this thought: I am leaving.
7 hours later, including a lapse back 2 hours into Mountain Standard Time, my plane is landing (or appears to be landing) in an area so flat, and so field-like, that I am fairly set on not liking Colorado. I stare out the window, anxious to see those Colorado mountains, anxious to spot civilization, because for the past 30 minutes of descent, all I have seen are circular crops that look like UFOs have landed there, and the occasional group of cattle. “Perhaps I am not in the right place,” I thought to myself. “Or maybe there really isn’t that much to the whole Colorado hype.” But then I thought of Holly and the incredible amount of time that had passed since we last saw each other. I thought of the amazing friendship we had and fought to still maintain over the course of her first year as not only a married woman, but a married woman who is very far away from me.
How?
How do we do that to ourselves? How do we go such a long time without seeing those that we love most? And why is this the apparent theme of my life these days?
I did not take much time to ponder these questions though, as my mind was filling up with images of her and I laughing hysterically over the silliest little things, of being goofy best-friends, of us cooking and dancing in the kitchen. I believe a smile even crept to my lips as I looked out upon that flat land and said, “I don’t care what Colorado is like, I just want my Holly.”
Right at that moment, the pilot angles the plane in such a way that my window fills up with mountain upon mountain, and not like any mountains I had ever seen before: these were real mountains. That smile of mine became much bigger and I may even have whispered it out loud, “Now that’s more like it.”
At the foot of these mountains (which I later learned are considered the Front Range, the mountains which allow for the demarcation between flat-kansas-like-Colorado and rocky-mountain-like-Colorado), are a bunch of houses huddled up against them. Those houses, I quickly deduce, must be Denver.
I did not actually see much of Denver, as after I am situated in the car and Holly and I have blurted out enough times “I can’t believe this is real!”, I shut my eyes and allow the exhaustion of the past 24 hours to dissipate into a nap that is occasionally interrupted by my ears popping as the altitude changes. Finally, one of those ear pops wakes me up, and my eyes themselves begin popping as I take in a total transformation of the land before me: no longer grey, dry, and flat, it is as if we have walked through the entrance to Narnia, and all I see are pines laden with snow and mountains that puncture the skyline.
I press my nose against the glass in my eagerness to see it all. Passing through the towns along the way, I marvel at the quintessential perfection of each and every house. I later discover that the towns are governed by rules of the HOA (Homeowners Association), and fines are made if you have too many things on your front porch.
I use the exclamation point not because I am happy, but because it is news, and it is something to be spread around with a sense of “wow”.
Zippering up the pocket where I re-enter my device, I sip some water and watch people while I wait till boarding time. There’s a happy-buzz simmering in my soul at this thought: I am leaving.
7 hours later, including a lapse back 2 hours into Mountain Standard Time, my plane is landing (or appears to be landing) in an area so flat, and so field-like, that I am fairly set on not liking Colorado. I stare out the window, anxious to see those Colorado mountains, anxious to spot civilization, because for the past 30 minutes of descent, all I have seen are circular crops that look like UFOs have landed there, and the occasional group of cattle. “Perhaps I am not in the right place,” I thought to myself. “Or maybe there really isn’t that much to the whole Colorado hype.” But then I thought of Holly and the incredible amount of time that had passed since we last saw each other. I thought of the amazing friendship we had and fought to still maintain over the course of her first year as not only a married woman, but a married woman who is very far away from me.
How?
How do we do that to ourselves? How do we go such a long time without seeing those that we love most? And why is this the apparent theme of my life these days?
I did not take much time to ponder these questions though, as my mind was filling up with images of her and I laughing hysterically over the silliest little things, of being goofy best-friends, of us cooking and dancing in the kitchen. I believe a smile even crept to my lips as I looked out upon that flat land and said, “I don’t care what Colorado is like, I just want my Holly.”
Right at that moment, the pilot angles the plane in such a way that my window fills up with mountain upon mountain, and not like any mountains I had ever seen before: these were real mountains. That smile of mine became much bigger and I may even have whispered it out loud, “Now that’s more like it.”
At the foot of these mountains (which I later learned are considered the Front Range, the mountains which allow for the demarcation between flat-kansas-like-Colorado and rocky-mountain-like-Colorado), are a bunch of houses huddled up against them. Those houses, I quickly deduce, must be Denver.
I did not actually see much of Denver, as after I am situated in the car and Holly and I have blurted out enough times “I can’t believe this is real!”, I shut my eyes and allow the exhaustion of the past 24 hours to dissipate into a nap that is occasionally interrupted by my ears popping as the altitude changes. Finally, one of those ear pops wakes me up, and my eyes themselves begin popping as I take in a total transformation of the land before me: no longer grey, dry, and flat, it is as if we have walked through the entrance to Narnia, and all I see are pines laden with snow and mountains that puncture the skyline.
I press my nose against the glass in my eagerness to see it all. Passing through the towns along the way, I marvel at the quintessential perfection of each and every house. I later discover that the towns are governed by rules of the HOA (Homeowners Association), and fines are made if you have too many things on your front porch.
The coordination of house paint, the architectural complement of design, and the general upkeep is foreign to this girl who grew up in a part of the world where the more stuff you had cluttering your front yard, the higher your status would rank as a redneck, and if you managed to keep your Christmas inflatables out all-year-round (whether or not they were actually inflated), you were considered efficient, if not even patriotic. Our neighbors (neighbor was a relative term that included anyone within 15 minutes of driving), often lived in condemnable houses. The only reason they were never evacuated was because the authorities that were needed to condemn the house never ventured over to our part of the woods except for the occasional house-fire or cardiac arrest. And even then, it was more likely that your EMT-certified “neighbors” would respond first and therefore evade the gaze of condemning authority. The houses remained inhabited.
I feel as if I have dropped into the middle of a storybook, but one which engages all the senses, because I find myself short of breath when we dash up a sidewalk through the snow and into a rest-stop. “This is the altitude, right??” I ask for reassurance. I am told to drink more water and eventually, I get used to it.
In Colorado, everyone wears a hat. Inside just as much as outside. I wear a hat too, but like the northerner that I am, I take it off as soon as I get inside. These people don’t. I think they might even sleep with them on.
There is sparkling water infused with CBD oil at the local coffee shop. The people are laid back, but they remain on top of things, and I imagine many of them hashtag themselves with, “Living my best life.” Although I do not sense the hostility of New Yorkers, people here aren’t exactly super friendly either. I think of Coloradian people as a mix between Californians (with their lifestyle and recyclables) and New Yorkers (with their ability to live in the cold), and somehow I feel that is a fairly accurate assessment.
My initial judgment of Colorado has melted away by the time day 5 arrives, in fact, I think I like it quite a lot. I tell a friend of Holly’s that it is time for me to go, and she says, “Well you could just move here like everyone else does.” I laugh; I guess all that hype about Colorado is true, and I can see why, though I do wonder for how long I could live in a storybook world.
One of my favorite parts about Colorado turns out to be the roundabouts which populate the roadways. I didn’t see one traffic light during my entire time there.
Granted, it was a roundabout which led us to breaking the law.
All I remember was this sense of impending doom as we continued in the right lane and Holly suddenly said, “We’re on i-70, why are we on i-70?! there is no exit for 15 minutes!!!” I had 5 minutes till I needed to be at a quaint little gas station called the Kum-&-Go, (I like to picture the owners of that operation around their dining room table trying to decide what to nominate the business--I think they were drunk when they did so), and like the name or not, my shuttle back to Denver was waiting for me there. I could not be late.
We’re going high-speed past Wednesday morning commuters: Holly is on the phone with her landlady and I am on the phone with my shuttle’s dispatch, asking what my options are. Landlady tells her that by the time we get to the next exit, it will be too late, so we need to break the law. Dispatch tells me that I need to drive safe but try and get to the Kum-&-Go ASAP because they can only give me 5 minutes more. With one hand on the wheel, one on the phone, one broken foot on the clutch, one good foot on the gas, and nothing on either the brake or the shift-stick, Holly turns left off the highway, through snowy-slush, and onto the ramp with the sign that says, “Authorized Vehicles Only.”
It felt a little bit like kamikaze yet surprisingly enough I did not scream. Instead, I thanked dispatch and told them we’d be careful. We both hung up and then realized that we were going in the right direction with no authorized vehicle tracking us down, so that was when we screamed.
The benefit of the adrenaline is that it made saying goodbye a whirlwind of, “We did it!!!” and it numbed the pain till later, when I unfolded a letter that had been secretly tucked within my backpack. I read it upon the plane with glistening eyes, remembering the joys of that blissful time.
The plane lands at one of my layovers and I am once again bombarded by screens. Here I am, watching the news and wondering, “Was the rest of the world on pause while I was gone?” The contents of the news seem to have undergone no change: President H. W. Bush’s death at 94 still appears to be the topic of the hour. But no, this is his funeral now. It seemed strange that my trip had spanned the announcement, bereavement, and finally, the remembrance of our late President’s life and death.
Four days after returning from Colorado, I am leaving the hospital: tired and exhausted with a side of fatigue. I had coordinated my trip so as to not use any PTO (worth more to me than money since PTO equates travel), and therefore worked 4 days straight after arrival. I stuff my hands into my coat pockets and my left hand fingers some sort of dried up leaf. Pulling it out, I remember that it is sage that I snatched off of a sage plant during our mountainside hike. Holding it up to my nose, breathing it in, I am transported back to clear air, blue skies, and my darling Holly's laugh echoing within my ears while we watch snow crystals dazzle in the setting sun.
I feel as if I have dropped into the middle of a storybook, but one which engages all the senses, because I find myself short of breath when we dash up a sidewalk through the snow and into a rest-stop. “This is the altitude, right??” I ask for reassurance. I am told to drink more water and eventually, I get used to it.
In Colorado, everyone wears a hat. Inside just as much as outside. I wear a hat too, but like the northerner that I am, I take it off as soon as I get inside. These people don’t. I think they might even sleep with them on.
There is sparkling water infused with CBD oil at the local coffee shop. The people are laid back, but they remain on top of things, and I imagine many of them hashtag themselves with, “Living my best life.” Although I do not sense the hostility of New Yorkers, people here aren’t exactly super friendly either. I think of Coloradian people as a mix between Californians (with their lifestyle and recyclables) and New Yorkers (with their ability to live in the cold), and somehow I feel that is a fairly accurate assessment.
My initial judgment of Colorado has melted away by the time day 5 arrives, in fact, I think I like it quite a lot. I tell a friend of Holly’s that it is time for me to go, and she says, “Well you could just move here like everyone else does.” I laugh; I guess all that hype about Colorado is true, and I can see why, though I do wonder for how long I could live in a storybook world.
One of my favorite parts about Colorado turns out to be the roundabouts which populate the roadways. I didn’t see one traffic light during my entire time there.
Granted, it was a roundabout which led us to breaking the law.
All I remember was this sense of impending doom as we continued in the right lane and Holly suddenly said, “We’re on i-70, why are we on i-70?! there is no exit for 15 minutes!!!” I had 5 minutes till I needed to be at a quaint little gas station called the Kum-&-Go, (I like to picture the owners of that operation around their dining room table trying to decide what to nominate the business--I think they were drunk when they did so), and like the name or not, my shuttle back to Denver was waiting for me there. I could not be late.
We’re going high-speed past Wednesday morning commuters: Holly is on the phone with her landlady and I am on the phone with my shuttle’s dispatch, asking what my options are. Landlady tells her that by the time we get to the next exit, it will be too late, so we need to break the law. Dispatch tells me that I need to drive safe but try and get to the Kum-&-Go ASAP because they can only give me 5 minutes more. With one hand on the wheel, one on the phone, one broken foot on the clutch, one good foot on the gas, and nothing on either the brake or the shift-stick, Holly turns left off the highway, through snowy-slush, and onto the ramp with the sign that says, “Authorized Vehicles Only.”
It felt a little bit like kamikaze yet surprisingly enough I did not scream. Instead, I thanked dispatch and told them we’d be careful. We both hung up and then realized that we were going in the right direction with no authorized vehicle tracking us down, so that was when we screamed.
The benefit of the adrenaline is that it made saying goodbye a whirlwind of, “We did it!!!” and it numbed the pain till later, when I unfolded a letter that had been secretly tucked within my backpack. I read it upon the plane with glistening eyes, remembering the joys of that blissful time.
The plane lands at one of my layovers and I am once again bombarded by screens. Here I am, watching the news and wondering, “Was the rest of the world on pause while I was gone?” The contents of the news seem to have undergone no change: President H. W. Bush’s death at 94 still appears to be the topic of the hour. But no, this is his funeral now. It seemed strange that my trip had spanned the announcement, bereavement, and finally, the remembrance of our late President’s life and death.
Four days after returning from Colorado, I am leaving the hospital: tired and exhausted with a side of fatigue. I had coordinated my trip so as to not use any PTO (worth more to me than money since PTO equates travel), and therefore worked 4 days straight after arrival. I stuff my hands into my coat pockets and my left hand fingers some sort of dried up leaf. Pulling it out, I remember that it is sage that I snatched off of a sage plant during our mountainside hike. Holding it up to my nose, breathing it in, I am transported back to clear air, blue skies, and my darling Holly's laugh echoing within my ears while we watch snow crystals dazzle in the setting sun.
I wonder if life is not about the state you live in, but the state of your love. Tucking the sage back into my coat pocket, I clock out and breathe in: I am grateful; my dearest people may be far away, but we share the type of love that grows stronger, the type of love you tuck into your pocket and never ever lose.
Hello Maryah. I am a Pastor from Mumbai, India. I am glad to stop by your profile on the blogger and the blog post. I am also blessed and honoured to get connected with you as well as know you and about your interest. I have enjoyed going through your blog post. I love getting connected with the people of God around the globe to be encouraged, strengthened and praying for one another. I have been in the Pastoral ministry for last 39 yrs in this great city of Mumbai a city with a great contrast where richest of rich and the poorest of poor live. We reach out to the poorest of poor with the love of Christ to bring healing to the brokenhearted. We also encourage young and the adults from the west to come to Mumbai to work with us during their vacation time. We would love to have you come with your friends towork with usduring your vacation time. I am sure you will have life changing experience. Looking forward to hear from you very soon. God's richest blessings on you, your family and friends. My email id is: dhwankhede(at)gmail(dot)com and my name is Diwakar Wankhede. Looking forward to hear from you very soon.
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