Thinking on the Plane

I wrote this February 17, on the plane to vacation destination. Then I didn't have internet service for a week:


I understand anxiety. I checked my bag before I left the house. I made sure I had my passport, my cell phone, my wallet, my gambling money (stashed safely away from the rest of the wallet). And then I did it again. And then I checked in the car just in case all those things had been stolen from my bag by bad travel spirits between the house and the car that was parked in the driveway.

But I am on the plane now and everything is still with me. I know I just checked.

Louis had an appointment,today, with the psychologist who was doing the assessment for the vocational office. We looked at the travel directions on the sheets the doctor had sent us. I called the doctor to get even more specific directions, pass the Fed Express office, cross the street where the CVS drugstore is and walk past the pizzeria. We went over it three times. And then I had the bright idea to open Google Earth- we zoomed in, we zoomed out. We looked at the street level views of the store the doctor told us about. We looked at the turrets on the fake regency buildings across from the CVS and then we practiced crossing the street-virtually. Then Louis copied down the web address of Google Earth so he could go home and look at the website.

Louis called from the Doctor's office. “I'm here Ms. Teacherfish.” I got to the office an hour early. I did everything we practiced.

I want to say I breathed a sigh of release. But truth to be told, I got caught up in the busy day and had forgotten all about his appointment. I told him I was glad he was there safe and I was I proud he did it all be himself.

The psychologist got on the phone. He asked me a little about Louis. He wondered if he was anxiety prone. I told the doctor, that sometimes Louis's fixation on things gets on people's nerves, and some people find him very annoying to deal with. But me I like him very much, anxiety and all.

Got to end here. Got to make sure my cell phone, my passport, my wallet are still in my bag. You never know – they could disappear from under the seat in front of me while the plane is in flight.