Detail Was Disposable

I’m stuck in seat 21D two rows back from our section’s main screen.  I am forced to now consider the Teenage Ninja Mutant Turtles movie.  I have just spent the last ninety minutes trying to not reacquaint myself with “Finding Nemo.”  Sublime discipline is required to ignore the attractive young woman, who is pouting now at the Turtles.   I don’t want to consider the implications for the fact that the supreme evil guy in the movie is cast as an Asian man. Donatello and the rest never stand still for more than a millisecond. Dozens of other anthropomorphasized oddities are running around as well, punching, rolling, eating worms and generally acting in a manner repulsive.  I can say “I don’t care” but acting that way takes work.  It projects independent of my will and nags at me despite my intention to block it out.

The two seats next to me are free, so I’ve room to spread out.  The stewardesses all seem like people I grew up with.  It’s going to be a long ride.  I try to ingratiate myself early.  Is United doing OK?  Economy Plus section on this flight is rather sparsely populated.  Everyone has a chance to spread out.  They must be loosing a tremendous amount of money with this flight.  There’s no need for a biz class ticket if you’ve three seats to yourself.

Sharp Bay sun in the Oakland morning.  I consider their garden on the way out.  Desert flowers, remarkable dry plants in their flower beds. Flora we never see in New York or Beijing.  It was a Sunday morning and so traffic was easy and I called everyone one last time on my hands-free car feature with my U.S. SIM card and my US data plan.  This illusion of immediacy means I dial my family regularly for no more or less than it would otherwise cost from China.  They feel nearer.  It was a Sunday morning so every major paper they stocked, had corpulent Sunday editions to consider.  I sat at a table in the lounge and tried to see which detail was disposable and which I might want to carry with me. The FT section on buying houses in Eastern Europe only brings me down. 

Now we’re landing.  It isn’t Sunday any more.  Elliot Smith is punctuating my typing.  He’s loud.  I’m louder, for now. 

I am reading as I type, but I’m tired and the type is only type.  A new, copper-toned minx has replaced the last heroine up on the broadcast and she’s upset about something, inaudibly.  Before I can corral myself, I care, for a second about why she is upset.  She is cut, mid consternation.  The plane’s landing gear comes out, below.  Beijing is clear through the portals.  That's always a relief.  Fiddle with my China SIM card and fish for a pen in all pockets of my bag so I can fill out my immigration card, before we deplane.