Faith, Hope, and Love: Tales from the Journey Home

Hmm...grading midterms and research papers that have piled up over the past 3 weeks or telling amusing stories on our blog...wonder which one I'll do? If you're reading this, we both know the answer.

C handled the long flights and long layovers well, overall. He handled the long layovers (4 hours in Tapei, 8 hours in San Fran) remarkably well. In Tapei, he walked the entire length of Terminal C (no, it really is Terminal C--it is not code for anything that I'm aware of) with me, by far the longest he has walked since he's been with us. And most of "people movers" weren't working, so we didn't cheat by riding them; though of course C was excited by moving along w/o having to walk on those that were working. He was especially enthralled by coming to an abrupt stop at the end of the automatic walk way. He couldn't get down the timing of taking that first step, but always kept his balance. We found areas with displays on native Taiwanese animals, over which he ooed and awed. We had to look at each photo twice (some three times). In a display area on Taiwanese culture, there was a display with many Chinese balloons. He had to touch each balloon on the bottom three rows (about two dozen balloons per row); then I had to lift him so that he could touch all the balloons on the fourth row. Even C noticed I was too short to be of much help in reaching the balloons in the fifth and sixth rows and didn't request that we try. We also found a play area with a sliding board. Of course, that was very exciting and it was interesting to see him gain confidence climbing and maneuvering around on the play equipment. T found another passage at our gate who was a nurse and, consumed with joy of discussing nursing for hours for the first time in 3 weeks, didn't seem to notice that C and my "short walks" took over an hour--twice.

C insisted on coming with me to the bathroom. But then he decided he didn't like being enclosed in the small stall, so opened the latch. I preferred to have the latch closed, for obvious reasons, and flipped it back. So C and I continued to go back and forth with the lock for several minutes. Then came a voice with an Indian accent: "Are you alright in there? Is the lock broken? Are you trapped? Should I call someone?" The questions kept coming as I'm trying to explain, through the stall door, and the incessant clicking of the latch, that everything is fine, it's just a toddler playing with a latch. Some conversations are wierd in any language, and some things are hard to communicate when the communicators primarily speak two different languages. This conversation would qualify as Exhibit A.

We were in business class for the flight from Tapei to San Fran. Ordinarily, this would be great. C, however, isn't used to sleeping in an upright position, nor does he like sitting with a seat belt. The business class seats have large, permanent dividers between them, so he couldn't lay across the seats to sleep. So he wasn't sleeping well and was pretty fussy. Still, we had bulkhead seats at the front of the plane, which gave us extra floor space. T and I put blankets and pillows on the floor and layed him out there to sleep. But then the pilots threw the fasten seat belts switch and the flight attendants make us wake him up to get him off the floor. C was unimpressed with the safety requirements of the airlines and voiced his objections intemperately, leaving T to pace the aisle trying to calm C. To me, this was much more unsafe than leaving a child sleeping on the floor, but I just observe and caustically catalogue inane and inconsistent enforce of the rules, I don't make them. T did not get any sleep on that flight and thus did not have any sleep for the previous 24 hours. I am sure that point is very important for you to know because it was made to me numerous times during the ensuing 8 hour layover in San Fran. I was able to get some sleep on this flight and promise to feel guilty about it for the rest of my life.

At the San Fran airport, C discovered the wonders of water fountains and automatic bathrooms. Water fountains apparently are most enjoyable when water is running over your chin and down your shirt. Having had such a good time with Ba in the Tapei bathroom, C joined me again in the stall in San Fran. C has been pressing the lever/button to flush toilets for me for several days now, so he was quite startled when the loud flushing noise occurred before he had pressed anything. A stunned look crossed his face and he took several steps backwards, almost staggering away from this bizarre event. He then leaned sideways to look around me to try to see what was happening back there to set the toilet off on its own. I'm still trying to figure that out myself.

San Fran didn't have any play areas or display areas (at least not in our wing), so entertaining C was a bit more of a challenge, particularly since he wasn't as interested in walking as he had been in Tapei. We watched planes taxi, take off and land--a lot. We kicked around a ball a bit. We bought a small toy plane that has lights and makes takeoff noises. He didn't sleep until just before we boarded the flight to Charlotte, but didn't get too fussy either.

He slept for about half the flight to Charlotte. Being back in the cheap seats, we could raise the arm rests and allow him to sleep between us, one being the head pillow, the other the feet pillow. When he woke up, the mean plane authorities quickly required seat belts, again causing vociferous protestations. So E provided entertainment by turning off and on the overhead reading lights for a while. Then we stacked and unstacked dixie cups for a while. Then C mushed up dixie cups and E unmushed them for a while. And intermittantly, we dug deperately through C's bag looking for the non-existant items which would not require any space or a tray table to use. T slept for almost the entire flight, just, though entirely insufficient, compensation for the fact that she had not slept at all on the previous flight and had not slept for the previous 24 hours (a fact I'm sure I have not sufficiently or adequately stressed to this point). I admit that I also slept for almost the entire 2 hours that C slept on this flight, meaning that I maintained my egregious surplus in sleeping hours. For this, I promise to deprive myself of sleep the next time I fly in order to open myself to opportunities for insights that one gains from not sleeping. (Funny, my students subject me to the insights they gain from not sleeping all the time. This leads me to be somewhat skeptical that the benefits of sleep deprivation are greater than the costs.)

Despite sleeping most of yesterday afternoon (still thinking it was VN time), C got through the night pretty well last night. He also let grandma stay up with him and rock him for an extended period.

This morning, C got to play outside on our swings and sliding board. And he supervised grandpa fixing some loose nails on our back porch. C made sure the nails that were not loose also received equal attention. Good stuff.