Thursday, November 25, 2010
I am not a big fan of the Thanksgiving holiday. It’s not that I object to giving thanks; God knows I have a lot to be thankful for. And it’s very good to be reminded of it. But for me it’s become the starting gun in a race to see how much food I can consume in a one-month period; and the endgame is a lifetime supply of self-loathing and remorse . According to most of the people I know who have traditional celebrations, the Thanksgiving dinner seems to have become nothing more than an unconscious dance of strained gaiety mixed with family angst, to the point where one wonders why the tradition survives except to reinforce some deeply internalized guilt and despair at not having come from the perfect family.
There is to my mind, however, one very wonderful and important purpose for Thanksgiving Day. It’s the perfect day to travel by plane. Especially in the mid-late afternoon, when everyone who is traveling for Thanksgiving is already at their destination. Today, Thanksgiving Day 2010, I was the only person in the security checkpoint line at the Delta Airlines international departure gates at JFK. I was ecstatic and sharing my joy with all of the airline personnel. I didn’t mind taking off my jacket, my vest, my shoes, my scarf and my pouch containing passport, boarding pass and drivers license. I pulled my computer out of my carryon roller and placed it in a bin, happily sliding it on to the conveyer belt. I danced over to the body sensors in the computerized screening area. My phone rang – Nancy had called to wish me a buon viaggio, and while we were chatting I noticed one of the security officers taking my carryon over to another belt for further inspection. The cosmetic tubes carrying my moisturizer and exfoliant were too large, over and above the 3 oz. limit. I had the option of putting them in my checked luggage or discarding them altogether, which seemed unnecessarily wasteful to me. The sympathetic officer walked me back to the baggage drop, confiding that the TSA official was watching the line, otherwise she would have let me pass.
My luggage was too far down the conveyor belt to retrieve. Ordinarily I would have just discarded the liquids, but with nearly 4 hours until my flight I asked a Delta employee to watch my carryon while I went through the security line again and scoured the shops for some little plastic bottles. I ended up striking out at several newsstands and cosmetics shops, finally hitting paydirt at Brookstone. I had to then go back out to the baggage drop area to fill the little plastic bottles with Oil of Olay and St. Ives Apricot Scrub. I created a workspace on the empty ticketing counter. It was like some weird little science experiment, transferring thick, gooey liquids and scrubs into the tiny opening of a 3 oz. plastic bottle. I felt a little loony. In my head I calculated the cost of the plastic bottles vs the cost of replenishing my supply on the other end. But I was too far gone to stop at this point and I struggled, filling four little bottles before I tossed the rest of the stuff away. I proceeded through the security check point once again, and even after all this time I was still the only person at security check. Giving thanks on Thanksgiving Day.
The Delta first class lounge has gone through renovations and is swankier than I remember. The food and snacks have not improved, but the space is more open and there are very few other VIPs traveling today. I have three complimentary glasses of Nero d’avola and several helpings of milk and white chocolate drizzled caramel popcorn. I have bypassed Thanksgiving, but I’m not out of the woods yet. The Italy food orgy has begun.
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