Dover
By: Funfetti
Every morning I wake up, after pressing the snooze button three times, I take a shower, eat breakfast, watch the news, make lunch for Mr. FF and I, jump in my car and go to work. Every morning I wake up and wish it were Friday. That I was somewhere other than the train. Or that I could get on the train, and speed off to an unknown destination.
This morning, Mr. FF and I had one of our rare trips into work together. We took a wrong escalator and ended up in another train station. Instead of being bombarded with announcements around the tri-state area, they were calling other towns in other states. I told Mr. FF it made me sad to be at that particular corridor at the station because I wanted to be going somewhere.
“You want to go to Dover?” he asked.
Sure, I want to go to Dover.
I remember being in a class in college and totally bullshitting some answer about my favorite spot in the city. I was so busy being consumed by loneliness and unfinished business that I hardly found the chance to explore a place I had always known, but never lived in until then. I told the professor and the rest of my class that I loved being in the train stations. Watching people come and go. The boards lit up with countless destinations. All you had to do was buy a ticket.
It may not be my favorite part of the city. But it’s certainly one that affects me. Even four years from the time I answered that question. Even when I was a little kid on the train to the city once a year.
Since then, I’ve traveled by myself many times on planes. I feel the same about airports. Is it weird that I’m inspired? This hub of people hustling and bustling because of pleasure or business fills me with something. Longing? I’m not sure. But the feelings that stir up inside me are ones I cannot ignore.
I feel like writing about escape and clinging on to the hope of something new is becoming a theme with me. I hate to be boring and predictable. I can’t help it right now, and I’m not sure why. Maybe if I woke up and felt content as to where I was going, these fantasies would start to subside and happiness could be encompassing my everyday life instead of wishing for something more.
Or maybe it’s not about any of that at all. Maybe I just want to be able to get on a plane to anywhere, on a whim. And this is more about freedom. The freedom I miss when we used to have three months off from school for about a million years. I think that practice should be instituted into adult life, don’t you? When I used to stay up reading to all hours of the night, spend my days at camp learning how to cheerlead or play tennis, and come home to a family dinner at 5:30.
Short but sweet this week.
A few more hours and I can enjoy the sunshine outside, and a 7:15 dinner with (GASP) my husband. That’s right. I’m married now. And that is at least one happy journey for this restless cupcake.
