Once again I’m driving through Seattle after the snow/ice storm that hit mid-January. The light is odd… like someone took a gigantic wet cloth and threw it over the sun. It’s not quite dark or light. David Bowie’s Space Oddity (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhSYbRiYwTY) is playing on the radio and it adds to the eerie quality of the drive.
People are still fragile from the snow that shut down the city. They’re driving like skittish animals and break at every little dip and turn; it makes the drive unpredictable. There’s bits of trees and debris everywhere. I keep driving over something that looks a heck of a lot like seaweed. How did that get into the middle of the road?
Getting here was an adventure. While still on the tarmac in Calgary, I’m sitting in first class with a crew of pilots when the steward comes over and breathlessly says, I’m truly truly sorry but the carbon monoxide alarm has gone off and we have to evacuate the plane immediately.
By the time the announcement is made to the rest of the plane, I’ve been shepherded off the plane rather unceremoniously… to a waiting area where we all wait and wait and wait. When the waiting is done there’s a short flight followed by more waiting.
By the time I get to Seattle I’m exhausted from all the waiting.