Dear Lady,

Well that was an awesome flight. It's been a long time since I was on a plane for that long. Probably not since we flew out west together.
And I'll begin by admitting that I didn't spend a lot of time gazing out my window. On a five hour flight there's only so much window gazing that one can do. So I spent most of the time watching movies on my iPad (which is now dead, along with the portable charger, and my headphones :) For a lot of that flight we were at 38,000 feet, so al I could see out my window anyway was clouds. And it was strange because the world looked green when I left the ground, but then after hours of flight wherein the world was blanketed in clouds we finally reached a clear patch of sky and . . . Wow, the entire world had turned brown. It was crazy! I'm not sure where we were, but everything was desert and treeless. It was a very strange contrast. Now that we've arrived in California, however, it's become an interesting blend of greens and browns.
And San Francisco has a crazy amount of watery-neighborhoods. I suppose that isn't too surprising given proximity to the ocean, but I hadn't ever thought about it before.
Want to hear something cool (I suppose this presupposes that you didn't think the other things I'd said were cool . . . )? I'm not sure why it happened, but they changed my seat assignment at the last minute so I moved up on the plane. I ended up with more leg room, a courtesy blanket (which I kept as a souvenir), and a full lunch for free! And not just like a drink and pretzels—I got lasagna, fruit, and cheesecake! What!?
Unfortunately I didn't realize the whole lunch thing until I'd already eaten the sandwiches I packed . . . oh well.
Anyway, we're about to take off again, but may all these letters serve as a reminder to you if my love and if how often you are what's on my mind and in my heart.
You are everything to me.

.a boy

Dear Boy,

It's time to get ready for swim lessons. I never fell asleep. Stinker. I had a hard time staying lucid on my way home. We stopped at Wegmans in Geneva to break up the trip and it was closed!!  Not a 24 hour store. That was crazy. Auburn slept in this morning. We were waiting for her to get up so Sam could take a nap. Eventually we went in to wake her up around 8:15. I finally started to fade around 9, but then the dogs woke up Sam.  Sam went back to sleep but I never did and now it's 10. 

I think it's okay, though. We'll have a good day. Our kids are fun and are good most of the time. I wish they wouldn't fight. I don't know how to help them change, but for the most part they are kind, helpful, smart, funny little people and I am humbled and honored to be their mom.

I'm glad you like flying. You do a fair amount of it.  I used to like flying. I'm not sure if I would anymore. It's been almost 10 years since the last time I flew. And I remember being a little motion sick, which was new. 

I hope you find some neat, wonderful things in California, even if you're only there for a short time and mostly doing family things. I hope you enjoy time spent with your family and find your relationships with them strengthened from this. 

I miss you. You leave an ache in my heart.

L

Dear Lady,

I can't believe that there are people in the world (like my mom) who don't like flying. I mean I really can't believe it. Flying is incredible. I love everything about it.

The experience, for me, all begins inside the airport—especially in larger airports. I like the hustle and bustle of people everywhere who hail from everywhere. There's an electricity of excitement and potential in an airport and everyone is waiting to take some journey, like dormant (static?) energy waiting to become kinetic.

The next thing I'll say is that I love that walk down the tunnel to the plane. And I love the walk down the tunnel to disembark the plane for that matter. That tunnel is this great moment of buildup before getting your place on the vehicle that will carry you thousands of feet into the air. Or it's the buildup before spilling you back out into the airport at a new destination. It's the metaphorical second act of a movie or play. And I love that feeling.

Finally (though not really finally but just in the interest of time) I love the sensation of being in the air—especially on cloudy days. I love the feeling as the cabin pressurizes and depressurizes as we pass through clouds. I think it's incredible to be lost in blinding white everywhere, and then that moment when you spill out through the cloud bank into clear sky and can look behind you and see the incomprehensible size of the cloud masses behind you. And I love when the clouds are just below us, and I can watch us skipping along above them, marshmallow mountains at our feet.

Yep. I love flying. I had and felt and experienced all of these things already today and I've only been on one flight so far!

I do love you.
I miss you.
I can't wait to see you again.
You are everything to me.
I absolutely love to travel and to fly,
but I will take your company over any flight any day.

.a boy

Dear Lady,

I miss you.
I love to travel,
but I miss you when I'm gone.
I hope your drive back home went alright, and that Sam (as well as the rest of the kids) behaves for you today. I hope you're able to get a morning nap while he naps. I hope you're happy today. I hope you smile and laugh and have fun with those wonderful kids of ours. I know they can be a handful a lot of the time, but most of the time I feel like I have kids who are so much better than I feel I deserve. They are incredible kids. Thank you for sharing them with me.

If I'm being honest I must admit that I certainly still don't talk as openly and as often as I would like with you. I am trying to do better, incrementally, and I hope you can see that. I'd like to confide more of myself in you and keep less of myself caged up in my own head. Even if it's sharing the same conversations with you that I have with myself (over and over), I still want you to be a part of that, because you are a part of me.
I hope you know that.

I love you so much.
I miss you so much.
I can't wait for Saturday night.

.a boy