In the taxi, on the long, expensive ride to the airport. (Here’s a Travel Tip – when Ryanair claims that they fly to Düsseldorf/Weeze, don’t think for a second that that brings you anywhere near to Düsseldorf – Weeze is really an ex-military airport in the middle of nowhere.)
As usual, a shame and a relief to leave: lovely to see Gerhard, great to connect with his cheerful and productive energy, good to see where the work should go; but it will be great to drop all the dirty clothes in the wash and put my feet up. That, of course, is many hours away – the grueling airport journey, with each part doubled, is still ahead of me.
The flickering thoughts, negative and positive, of the past week – last night they were overlapping in a particularly chaotic manner: the sense that I could do all this work, invaded by the sense that I will again fail. Right now, the ayes have it; but I am not unconscious that when I get home, to my pleasant apartment, but also to a barrage of e-mail; to my own kitchen, but also my tendency towards isolation; to my friends, but no one who really seems to help me feel creative, positive, energetic – that the nays will win again. Of course it’s always in a mental state like this that one is exceptionally aware that there is always a choice: that you can always sidestep the naysaying voices….
We’ll see. Meanwhile, leaving Germany: very efficient, slightly depressing; highly productive, faintly inhuman. Gray skies, but different than those in northern England, which have shades that suggest the distantly stormy North Sea….
Another tip: don’t get trapped in Stansted (theoretically London, but not really of course) airport for too long; boring, limited, crowded. Worse in August, I assume; although it’s wonderful that air travel in Europe has gotten so cheap, it means that the airports are a constant chaos of people going all over the place. Ah, for a way of traveling that is both cheap – and elite….
On the other hand, it has its moments. In front of me two restless Italian kids and an English kid – all three are tiny; 5-6 years old? – are laughing and trading grins, sharing a joke, without understanding a word.
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