Home Alone: Confessions of a Phasmophobic

There was a perfectly reasonable and scientific explanation for most of what happened to me last night. I'll accept it for now.

I returned from my business trip to an empty house. Nobody was waiting anxiously for my plane to land. Most of my friends were already far from town, enjoying their Memorial Day adventures. Sam was at Lake Tahoe, shepherding a group of Episcopalian teenagers through a weekend of (hopefully) spiritually satisfying activities.

The house was both welcoming and lonely, a reminder that I had two more days as a single woman before my life returned to normal.

I know plenty of people who appreciate time apart from their significant others. I'm not one of them.

Oh me? I'm on business.

I have a confession to make. I love business trips.

Among my contemporaries, it's fashionable to complain about travel. Somehow, these complaints always strike me as overly affected.

"Oh, mercy me! If I have to eat free room service salmon one more time, I do believe I'll die of ennui!"

If I traveled every week, or I had a precocious toddler in my possession, I might feel a little resentment toward these trips. But I don't. And so I approach business trips as I approach most of life's little inevitables: with as much joy as possible.

Where Not to Stay in Vegas

A few weeks ago:

Monica: Would you be willing to sleep in McCarran Airport if it saves us $400 in air fare?

Sam: What? Why?

Monica: The flight from Fargo to Vegas gets in at 10:30 p.m.. That's too late to catch a flight to Reno, but we could fly out the next morning.

Sam: I am not sleeping in the airport. If you can find a hotel room, we'll talk.

Monica: Oooh, I can get a room at the Howard Johnson for 40 bucks. It's right next to the airport, and it has a free shuttle.

Sam: Sure.

Monica: I've never stayed at Howard Johnson, but it's a chain. How bad can it be?

Reflections on Fargo

Unless tomorrow includes disasters of TV-movie proportions, I'm ready to declare successful completion of my best visit to Fargo since I moved to Nevada seven years ago.

I'll never forget the look on my mother's face when she entered the Chinese restaurant and saw me and Sam standing there. She had no idea we were coming. Not a clue. Once the initial shock and confusion dissipated, she was happier than I imagined, even in my best daydreams.

Somewhere to the east, a storm is drenching the North Dakota prairie. It is too far away for me to hear the thunder, but the view across the flat, treeless prairie seems infinite. Spindly lightning bolts and bright washes of blue flash aganst the sky. I've been watching them like fireworks, each display more impressive than the last.

Happy Birthday, Mom

Tomorrow is my mother's birthday. She will be 65.

My mother has led an action-packed life. She grew up in Poland. She was a doctor. So was my dad. He posed as a spy so they could escape the Communists and build a better life for their kids.
It sounds like a cheesy movie script, but this is the story of my family.

My mother grew up in Poland.

I grew up in North Dakota.

My life has been very drama-free, compared to my parents' lives. That's exactly what they wanted.