Observations on Travel

DIA is a lovely airport; it looks like a bunch of very large circus tents clustered together, built out on the plains just east of Denver. The idea was that its architectural form and shape was to emulate the snow capped Rocky Mountains. Still looks like circus tents to me. From my house barring traffic, it takes about 40 minutes to get there. The drive to the airport was uneventful in spite of the over passes having ice, there were no accidents or heavy traffic so I arrived much earlier than planned and saying goodbye to mom, I stood inline to check in curbside. Note to self, luggage that rolls is much nicer than an oversized duffle bag. No more duffle bag.

Once checked it, it’s the long stroll, through the upper part, to get down to security. As I’m not traveling on a weekend the lines were not painfully long. Just the typical, hurry up and get there only to slow down and strip down in security. Oh how I miss the days of being able to show up at the airport, with 10 minutes to make your flight. Today, things have tightened up even more. While there are not soldiers with machine guns, like what happened right after 9/11, Security is still tight only in different ways.  First there is the long line just to get up to the first TSA agent. There each person’s identification was scrutinized against their boarding pass. If all seems right a little stamp was put on the pass and you’re allowed to proceed.  That’s when I have to practically strip down, pull out my lap top, put that, my backpack, coat and boots into a bin, where they can go through x-ray and I get to walk through security. No beep always a good sign and its time to put myself back together. Benches are thoughtfully provided as a place to sit down and put your shoes back on and your things back where they belong, then it’s off to the gate.

My gate was all the way at the end of the east side of concourse C. There were big sunny windows where I sat and waited, people watching as I listened to my IPod. There was one lovely woman that had an amazing smile, you couldn’t help but light up when she would flash it. Just one of those people that you felt good being around, at least superficially considering that it was only a moment in time at an airport. The person sitting next to me on the plane was in her final year of college down in LA, sociology major. She and her boyfriend were traveling back to Ohio to meet his family before he ships off to Afghanistan for 6 months. I could see and hear the worry in her voice as she tried to pass it off as just a thing.

I saw a great lake from the air, being geography major you would think I would remember which lake is the furthest west. Well I don’t so I sat amazed as I passed over this large body of water that seemed to stretch endlessly to the north. The landscape below me was flat, with the patchwork pattern of farmlands, a few wind farms, and the vastness punctuated by rivers, and cities clustered around interstates, and major roads.

Landing, again comfortably uneventful, I waited to deplane, everyone following the unannounced yet seemingly part of our lexicon in how to deplane. Lessons learned in kindergarten actually remembered.  Each was polite, helped one other with their overhead baggage and waited patiently for their turn to get out of their seat, gives one hope for humanity. Then again it could be that everyone was in a good mood as the flight attendant sang while we were landing and taxing to the gate, which brought enthusiastic applause from the passengers.

 I headed towards baggage, and coming down the stairs I saw my friend, and all I could do was smile, whatever nerves I had, poof gone, it was my friend smiling waiting for me.

We drove from the airport and the first thing I noticed was that it was flat, mostly. There were some rises, but for the most part, flat. The second thing I noticed is that it reminded me of parts of Tennessee.

This is an interesting place Michigan; I can see the connection between Tennessee and here. The landscape is a lot of alike, the trees the feeling is the same. All that is really missing is the heavy southern accent and the smell of fried food in the air. The real connection is that a lot of people moved up from the south to work in the auto industry here during its boom time, and when they retired they would move back to Tennessee or Kentucky. They were Yankees by accent, yet southern by birth.

Where I am, you cannot feel the despair or see that the economy in this region is in dire straights, as I am in the suburbs. As most suburbs goes, this one do not seem to be particularly cookie cutter. It does not remind me of Thousand Oaks transplanted in a hundred different places, namely Cool Springs, TN. It seems to have is own rhythm and pattern, and the streets are laid out kind of different. I have only seen one chain restaurant so far and surprisingly enough it was not a fast food place.

There is definitely a different culture here than say, Colorado, the west coast and most definitely not the south. There is a slight accent to the voices, but not so smothering as a southern one. This is definitely the land of Red Wings. As I was passing a shop in the airport I paled slightly seeing all the Red Wing gear prominently displayed, unlike Colorado where, it’s the football team colors and logos displayed proudly, proclaiming it to be Bronco country. There is even a very large statue, of a blue stallion with red eyes that greets visitors to the Rocky Mountain state as they leave the airport. I found much to my relief there was no large menacing statue of a Red Wing player brandishing his stick welcoming all to Detroit.