Apologies for my one week hiatus. I know, how rude, right???
Sometimes I really identify with George Clooney in Up in the Air because I feel like I’m always coming and going from an airport. Or, well, I used to be. Pre-pandemic and pre-Margie. I’ve never fired anyone like George did in that movie, but I have had a soul crushing affair (gotta keep it interesting, people!). That’s not the important stuff though. What’s important is my feelings toward airports. And they’re complicated, ok!!!
I don’t love airports or airplanes at all, I get headaches from the air pressure and I’m always anxious about something that has either happened or not happened…
…but they seem to have a positive affect on my productivity. I wish I could be as productive in my office as I am on an airplane. Being tucked away with no cell service, no fridge to stare at, and no access to Netflix does me wonders!! I try to conjure these limitations at home by turning off my phone, hiding it in drawers, putting on some wonderfully ignorable 60s French pop, but my brain simply knows too much. It knows I could go pace around the apartment and rearrange furniture instead of drawing. But on the plane I can draw and draw and draw and eat cheez-its and draw some more then eat pretzels, draw again, move on to the popcorn… maybe some cheese…
It’s also always fascinating to stare at other people’s screens. Why is what your neighbor is watching, one row ahead of you, so much more interesting than what you’re watching in your own row? And it’s like, I know I could turn on what they have on, and yet I don’t want to? I want to pine about their screen from a distance as they giggle at Bridesmaids and I watch my 5th hour of Law & Order that I’ve seen 5-7 times.
I love watching the lives of other people, on and off airplanes. It’s all so riveting. What are they doing here? Why are they on this trip? Did they really just order another bloody mary? Shocking. One time I read a woman’s text as she was breaking off an affair she had clearly had that weekend, and was now returning to home her husband. I felt like I was in a Danielle Steele novel!
I just got back from visiting my family and would you believe, I sat next to the exact same people on the way back, that I did on the way there?! Here I thought, “No one will know that I’m wearing the exact same outfit from last week” and low and behold, there they were, the mother and son duo that clearly love to farm, probably wondering if I owned any shirts that didn’t say “Sleepless in Seattle.”
I’m on a plane a lot because I’ve chosen to live the life of “California Girl in New York Who Really Misses Her Family But Also Isn’t Sure She Wants To Move Back.” It’s been a never ending saga for the past seven years. It seems I’m always delayed, physically, emotionally… trying to get… *somewhere*. Poetic, yes?
There are thousands of cartoons about being delayed at the airport, here’s an old one of mine.
I find airports (and airplanes) to be emotional places. It seems like I can feel life actually moving when I’m there. Like the space is some vessel that I’m aging inside of, with all my old and new habits that surround the ritual of traveling. One of my absolute favorite airport rituals (outside of Starbucks chai lattes and chewing my way through a pack of gum) is sending *~emotional texts~*.
What a thrill it is to sit in a tiny chair, cramped, constipated, yet still eating, and send off takes like “I had such a fucking great time” and “Why did it go by so fast???” My wild airport emotions are probably why I get so much work done on planes. It’s because I have something to draw about. Something happened. Something made me laugh. Something I didn’t want to forget. When I’m in New York I’m not always as good as paying attention to the minutiae of life. But when I go somewhere else, I get so excited to draw diary comics because it all feels so new and different!
My Aunt Sherry calls all the pieces of traveling “phases.” Early phases are packing, then getting up in the morning, there’s a whole phase about just getting to the airport, then you have your tickets, then you cry your way through security. You get it. There are so many phases. One of my new phases is “wondering about birds in the airport and whether or not I can think of a joke about them.”
I could go on but then again, I don’t want to. You get it. I work well in airports.
On another note, I’m in The New Yorker this week!
Psssst. Secret, secret for my readers. I’m going to be at New York Comic Con next week and I’ll have 10 advanced copies of Murder Book that I’ll be giving away for FREE. But what booth will I be at?! And what day!??? Stay tuned for details… This feels like a murder mystery already!
Thank you for reading! New posts every Friday!
ICYMI: If you pre-order my book this month you’ll get Law & Order stickers!
Song on repeat: Bipolar by The Happys
Short film I saw on TCM that I’ll never stop thinking about about: The Relaxed Wife
Obsessed with: picking at my face, tbh
Order prints and more on Etsy!