I
guess now is the time when I should be wrapping everything up and
patting myself on the back and saying “hey you did it, you
survived!” another year in France gone past.
Saying
goodbye is the odd part that doesn't ever seem to fit in, no matter
how far on the scale of sweet-to-sadness the goodbye ends up on. It
is when you're the one moving when goodbye doesn't fit in –
everyone and everything else disappears into the background which you
leave behind and then you have to keep moving and keeping your
spirits up, for the next step ahead in your new horizon. Those
backgrounds fade away from sight but no matter how hard you try
they'll never fade away completely because you'll always close your
eyes and hear the laughter of those old friends and smell the breeze
and see the buildings, the skies and the horizons that you left
behind, all of which keep on living without you there.
There
have been many weeks leading up to this moment, the moment I know is
coming to an end and strangely I waited for this moment a long time
ago I thought that the end in sight would be a triumphant and
victorious moment but in actual fact the ending to this era is in
sight and the emotion is somewhere in the middle on the scale of
sweet-to-sadness.
I
can't describe the feeling that goodbye gives in so many words,
except that it's difficult to define and I might have to describe it
in the airport instead. This weekend I was in the airport again, and
over the past few years I've ended up in the airport, waiting all by
myself, and watching the airport life go past. It makes you think as
you're looking out over this particular horizon, the runway where
aeroplanes are always landing. It makes you wonder at the idea that
this is a special place because this is where lives are changed,
changed because here is where you are moved from one place to
another, and with it moves so much more than just your belongings.
I've
ended up looking out over the runway, late evening as the sun starts
going down, looking at the different planes out there. Absurdly, I
think to myself that if you gaze on out of focus, those planes look
like cartoon birds, rolling lazily across the tarmac. This is their
back garden, landing and ascending as frequently as birds do.
Time
to leave, as ever.
But
like I said, goodbye, the word doesn't sit well with me. I won't
leave, I'll tell myself it's a temporary change. My whole life I've
been telling myself just that, watching from the glass walls at that
enormous stretch of golden tarmac on those days where the sun is
brilliant and the lazy planes are stretching their wings. They're
like old friends, those cartoon birds, old friends that are always
coming back to me, pulling me away from the ground, sending my life
spinning and always projecting me up into the clouds with them,
without a moment to properly say goodbye.
Down
here on land, where friendships form and reality takes shape,
emptiness is filled by something at least. Up in the sky with the
clouds and the quiet and the planes outstretched wings guiding you
forward reality stops – just people sleeping until land appears
again.
When
the solid ground impacts the wheels, that's when the change happens
and the reality takes its shape again. For days or months or years,
in your heart you are restless, excited, touched, tearful, even, and
the planes in the sky leave their trace; every time you look up there
they are calling to you and beaming at you from those places you
can't reach.
That's
the nature of airports. The place where all kinds of thoughts can
enter your mind and make you think about what it does to you, moving
and changing and living all over the world.
So
here I am in France, saying goodbye again and here I am wondering in
spite of myself what comes next. It is a big open horizon, that's
what change is; what comes after is the next mystery to solve and in
between there's now, I suppose, to make the most of the last days.
