Sheila Sims Iding
It’s the same place. You take the same road…the same route…the same directions. It’s just sometimes the journey feels different.
Today we will head to Detroit Metro Airport. DTW. When you get in the car there is already excitement even a couple of hours away from that destination. You are sitting in a car but if you weren’t…there would be a skip in your step. Instead there is a skip in your thoughts as you travel down I-96.
You make small talk but the words are covered with smiles and you don’t really care what is being said. That is not your focus. Your focus is the passing of time as you pass Williamston then Fowlerville then Howell then Brighton. And did time always pass so slowly between Williamston and Brighton? Shouldn’t that have gone faster?
Past Brighton it is starting to feel less like mid-Michigan and more like Detroit. Once on I-275 you are almost arriving at the arrivals. And…when you see the Eureka Road exit sign it will feel like a "welcome" sign and you can say you are there.
Parking the car always takes longer when you are heading to the arrival section of the airport. And family members seem to take too long to gather things and exit the car. And the few minutes it takes to park seems like way more than that. And when you finally park you have to really THINK about where you parked because your thoughts are not focused on remembering section 6A of the lot.
Your thoughts are not really focused at all. They are racing to that international terminal…those doors that open (after the long wait in customs) and…that hug. THAT hug! (If you’ve ever had a Timothy Iding hug…you know exactly what I mean. He must have learned it from Grandpa Barrons because it envelops you instantly…and feels more genuine and comforting than most hugs could.)
And as you gather luggage and bags and smiles and those hugs, you start back to Section 6A of that parking garage and you bring him home. I will say that again because I love the sound of those words. You bring him home. And the talk is unceasing. And the catching up is quickened. And the bonding is renewed.
On the journey home you pass 275 and Brighton and Howell and Fowlerville and Williamston you think of home and a family room being family again. And as soon as you get HOME, the bags will be left by the door for greeting pets, grabbing snacks and reclaiming your spot in the family room. The arrival journey is complete. And Tim is home…until he is not. Until the same journey begins again.
That is the journey that seems different. The bags are by the door again. Just like they were 4 weeks ago. But this time they are not for unpacking. They are for packing. And the road traveled is the same. You go down 96 past Williamston past Fowlerville past Howell past Brighton. But somehow the distance between those signs seems to come faster on this journey. And the sign for I-275 doesn’t add skips to your thoughts. And the Eureka Road exit doesn’t cause your excitement to race and this time it doesn't feel like a welcome sign at all.
You park in the same Section 6A…just to help you remember. And this time family members seem to gather things too quickly. You wish time was slower for this journey. And there are bags and luggage and smiles and hugs…just like there were at the arrival…and they seem the same…but they aren’t. The bags aren’t coming home…they are going half-way around the world. The smiles are through tears and the hugs are more for comfort than for greeting.
The hugs are meant to last and give comfort for the months apart and the journey back down 275 to Brighton past Howell past Fowlerville past Williamston. The talk will be quiet. The smiles will be limited. And we will head back home to boxes of leftover cereal, unfinished cheese and unopened cans of Dr. Pepper and a too quiet family room.
It just amazes me how the same journey, on the same road, with the same people can be so different from arrival time to departure time. In a few hours we will begin the arrival journey and the excitement of the trip to DTW arrivals and quick talk and even quicker smiles on the trip back home.
In a few weeks (that will seem shorter than they should) we will do the exact same journey…past those towns…down those roads…to those exits. How can the words “arrival” and “departure” bring such different emotions? That is a question I don’t have to think about today. Today is arrival day and the beginning part of that journey that is the same…but different. I am not going to think about departure day. That will come soon enough. And on that day my heart will ask the question: How can the same journey be so different?