Landing

I've done a lot of that in the last week. First in D.C., where Marketing Sis lives -- several months ago, I'd planned a visit, hoping, among other things, to catch a performance of Stravinsky's Rite of Spring at the Kennedy Center with her. (We have a more than slightly irreverent appreciation for this piece, but that's a story for another post.) Arrived last Tuesday. Took off again Friday for Canada. Came back for the remainder of my visit Sunday.

My grandmother passed away just before I was supposed to come to D.C. I'd meant to write something to honor her nearer to the date of her death, but I knew the stress of travel prep would keep me from doing that properly. So here I am, trying to find words, but none are coming. There are images, snatches of beautiful things other people said at her funeral last weekend. Still, this isn't the right moment for me to think of her in the way I'd like. Perhaps in a few days. I'm leaving again on Friday to go to a wedding in New York. Once that's over, once I've landed for good in Seattle, I can do this. It seemed important, though, to mark her departure sooner in this space; hence these sentences.

Landing here twice in one week has let me remember my first trip alone to this city too. I was moving here for the summer to intern at a magazine, with only the address of a university dorm anchoring me to the world beyond the airport. The rice cooker my mother insisted on letting me borrow -- there was no stove, just a microwave and fridge in the efficiency I'd found -- didn't fit in my luggage, to her dismay. But it wasn't until my plane was gliding in over the Potomac, giving me a clear view of the Capitol dome, that I started to feel panic. "What have I gotten myself into," I whispered as we touched down, suddenly doubting my credibility, eligibility, whatever had supposedly earned me the right to be there. I'd never held a paid writing job before.

Returning so many years later, following the same trajectory past the Capitol, remembering my fear on the plane's final approach -- it was an odd feeling. I still write, in a slightly different form. And there's fear that goes with it, not so much about the prospect of doing it but whether I can sustain it, given its emotional demands. What have I gotten myself into? I'm still not sure. But I have to believe in it, or try my best to, even when words refuse to stick to the page.

So today, even without a clear sense of what I'm trying to say, I attempt.