Planes are my love language

Sitting in art class in year 9, my neck sore over my painting. Angus and Julia Stone softly plays from Ms Phillip’s desk speakers. Big Jet Plane.

I didn’t get to travel very much on planes when I was young. Dad was sick, so we tried not to go too far. Kind of like when you stretch out homemade pizza dough big but not so big that you tear a hole in it, and it just fits on the tray. Enough for two, not for very long, all gobbled up.

I’m not sure how to tell Rebecca I love her anymore. Words say words and make noises which vibrate all the air around us and then our ears convert it into something that means something. Usually telling her I love her has a lot of colours: the oranges on my spray painted jacket and of the sun peeking through her townhouse blinds and of the brickwork of an old Victorian bar; greens of limes and pot plants; blacks of tattoos and stamps to clubs and karaoke microphones.

My words were always backed up by an action. Good people don’t talk about kindness, they practice it. I can’t practice it like I did before.

Airports are meditative. No obligations to talk, work, or be anything but comfortable. Decorated, but not funky decorated. Clinical in their reflective surfaces.

I was in Rwanda when everything got serious. It was awful, and we all had to run home just in time. It brought my whole travel group closer together, emotionally. I drink wine with them on google hangouts every odd week, still. 

I dress up in cherub earrings and scrunchies to go to my doctor appointments. I can’t wait to put on my green overalls again, stuff three outfits in a backpack, and run away into the never never. Peter where are you?

When Rebecca moved away and I swore to visit her, I fell in love with her city. Bumping shoulders with strangers and having bars play hide and seek with you. I meticulously loved every step of the process. Trawl for tickets. Pack my bag the hour before my flight. Put on my biggest jacket that I couldn’t fit in my bag. Forget to tell my parents exactly where I am going and when I will be home. A glass of wine. Get on the flight and eat $5 falafel. Sleep, or don’t. Get to her couch at 1:30am. 

The process was how I showed Rebecca that I loved her. It was how I showed all my friends I did. It’s how I reassured myself in my belly that I was showing the people I love that I do really love them. From rural trains to all-sorts between Sydney and Melbourne, to sitting on the tram for an hour and a half for a twenty minute hello. Delivering sandwiches and making cupcakes or gnocchi sauce or focaccia, my favourites to cook and bake. Fill my belly and their belly with love. I fell asleep on a friends doorstep once and waited around an hour for them to wake up to let me in. That day I found a picture of a duck to give to Rebecca as a gift. No doubt she loved it.

It’s a little grief I think, I’m not sure though. It’s kind of painful to think about.