August 30, 2007

August 30, 2007
@ 30,000 Continenal flight 1702
returning home from placing my mother in an Alzheimer Unit

Cultural re-integration confronts me as I arrive in San Francisco, change out Euros for green dollars of the same size, color and net worth. Never one to translate either millimeters or Euro, I’ll re-enter life in the tree lined, hills, cloudless skies and wooden structures where I inhabit a Victorian built in 1892, full of my possessions.

Almost three weeks have passed since I landed at SFO. I traveled in a daze on one hour of sleep, searching for my flight information only based on a confirmation number.

I arrived at the gate with two liters of wine and one half liter of Jeneve. Shocked as the attendant placed these into the refuse bin. Where had I been? What was I thinking? Since the Jeneve was in a special ceramic bottle featuring a photo of the bridge at the corner of Zuid Willemsvaart, I returned and fished it out of the trash, emptying the contents over other’s absent mindedness.