General Mitchell Airport, Milwaukee Wisconsin

General Mitchell Airport, Milwaukee Wisconsin

5:45 am

I don't quite stumble down the broad hallway leading to the security check. It's more like almost tripping past lighted signs displaying neon letters and happy business men, beneath bleached fluorescence swimming in the lofty ceiling. I can't tell if I'm sick or just asleep on my feet. Of course, now is when I need to be assertive about who I am and what I'm doing in the airport to begin with. Not to mention tying and untying my shoes while people wait in line behind me, calculating the liquid measure of my portable toiletries and remembering on the spot if I removed my favorite pocketknife from my jeans pocket.

Every time I perform this travel strip-down I shake my head; we're disarming on purpose, so in the event of an attack, we just made things a little easier for antagonists. Well, I still have my Sharpie pen. One day air travel will be done naked, and standing up.

We sit in a row of black vinyl chairs, which slowly fill up with fellow passengers. Some are dazed, clad in loose faded sweats and potentially smelling like sleep and unbrushed teeth. Some appear more wakeful but upon settling down beside their wheeled canvas carry-ons, they fit white earbuds into their ears and succumb to the prevalent stupor.
The really diligent, the proud few who can boast being fully dressed and fair smelling, stand with their backs to those of us slouched in the chairs, staring through the window wall at a slate pink dawn. We all keep polite distance with empty seats between us and pretend not to listen to each others' conversations. The nearest standing man caves into a chair at last: Standing was only a tactic to ward off sleep. I was made suspicious of this by the rapid sneaker-tapping he'd been keeping up while he inspected the soundproof glass between us and the runway.

The dawn fades up to a transparent blue, split on the horizon by bright pink and steel gray clouds. A few more minutes pass, the reflections of the overhead light boxes start to dwindle. I sip grainy hot chocolate as quickly as I can through the tic-tac sized hole in the plastic lid. The more it cools, the grainier it gets. The whipped cream was thin and disappointing, gone almost before Jeremy brought it.

A snarkid, sneezy smell of smoldering egg, starch and maple syrup is making my nose run more than usual. I can now add that to my list of allergies: Breakfast burning. It hits me in the face when I come out of the women's bathroom portal into the wide, polished hallway lined with convenience shops and the culprit, somewhere, pumping out that sickening smell.

It's incredible what one will put up with to visit one's family. More incredibly, people have put up with much worse and complained less.