I’m writing this in the early morning from my aunt’s house in Lynden because I’m still on Wisconsin time.  It would be nearly time to get up for work if I were in Door County.  I have flown back to the Pacific NW to go to my 40th high school reunion, but also to accomplish several things and most importantly to see my family.

Yesterday Mark and I got up early and made the three and a quarter hour trip to the Milwaukee, WI airport.  We were there a couple hours early so we went into the airport museum.  I’ve never seen an airport museum before, but Wisconsin is proud of their boys who made good!  The airport is named for General William (Billy) Mitchell.  Mark was telling me a little about him.  He was from Wisconsin and he went into the air force, I think around WWI when planes were still new.  He was kind of a pioneer for ways to use airplanes in war.

General William “Billy” Mitchell

The other Wisconsin native I recognized was Jim Lovell, the astronaut.  They had a display about him and a display about a company called Astronautics that was founded in Milwaukee.  There were displays of models of various airplanes, including the Zeppelin dirigible.

The Jim Lovell display

Astronautics Corporation of America

The Zeppelin model in comparison with a jet model

When it came time to go to my gate, Mark watched from a distance as I went through security, which I passed easily.  I asked the last woman who worked with me if there was a way I could say goodbye to my husband and she said, “Oh yeah, you still have plenty of time before your flight.  Just go out and come back through security again.”  So I did.  Mark was surprised to see me back and so was the woman at the beginning of the security process, but I got my bear hug and kisses!

I had two carry on bags.  I was flying on Southwestern and the aisle was so narrow that I barely made it through with the larger of my two bags, which was smaller than the limit.  Other than that, I enjoyed the flight.  The stewardesses had a good sense of humor.  The one who did the usual instructions about what to do in case of a disaster ad libbed a bit and got us laughing.  The one who came around to serve us drinks and snacks wore sunglasses that had over-sized eyes painted on them.

Stewardess with a sense of humor.

I was sitting next to a high school aged boy and got to visiting with him a bit.  He’s reading Great Expectations by Dickens for school and every fifteen chapters he has to take a test.  Really!?  In July?

I found out that I was allowed to use Internet while I was on the plane after I’d gone to all the trouble of putting my tablet in plane mode, but I was having difficulty figuring out how to connect it to the plane’s wifi so I asked my young seatmate.  I have found that when I’m having technical difficulty I just need to ask a young person what to do!  I finally got connected and was most interested in watching our progress across the country and what altitude and speed we were going.  I took pictures out the window knowing I’d seen much of what we were flying over from the ground.  I got particularly excited when I saw Mt. Rainier poking through the clouds, and then again when I saw the Space Needle and the big Ferris Wheel Mark and I had ridden on a year and a half ago.

Mt Rainier poking out of the clouds

Coming into Seattle

When we landed and I was walking through the concourse looking for my connecting flight to Bellingham, I looked at my watch and it said it was 5:15.  My next flight was at 5:50, so I thought, “Good! I have time enough to find the gate.”  Then I saw an airport clock that said it was 3:17.  It took me a moment to remember that I had crossed a couple time zones.  It’s been a while since I’ve flown anywhere.

The plane to Bellingham was Alaska Airlines and I had to walk out on the tarmac to board.  It was a small plane with two exits and it was so full (seventy six passengers) that they had had to ask for a couple volunteers to take a later flight because they were overbooked.  I knew that Aunt Marg doesn’t drive after dark, so I didn’t volunteer.  This time my seatmate was a young man named Ahmed.  I was working on a crossword puzzle book and I noticed him looking over my shoulder so I said, “Do you do crosswords?”  He said he enjoyed them but hadn’t worked on them for a while, so I invited him to jump in if he saw a word I was missing.  This time the plane was only in the air for about half an hour so we just barely finished the puzzle by the time we landed.

I grabbed my bags and walked into the little Bellingham airport and caught a glimpse of my aunt.  What a joy it was to see her again and give her a big hug!  All I had had to eat all day was snacky stuff so she took me to Taco Time so I could eat dinner.  We chatted about everyone in her family and about the goings on in Lynden and at her volunteer job.  When we got to her house I called Mark (who had already left a couple messages on her answering machine) and let him know I’d made it safely.  Then I offered to play a game of Scrabble with Aunt Marg.  Toward the end of the game, I kept falling asleep because it was close to midnight on Wisconsin time.  She is wily enough to take advantage of that and we actually tied!  I don’t think I’ve ever tied with someone when I’ve played Scrabble before.  It was a good game.