Travel Treats

Had an excellent week in PA to visit my father, enjoy Easter, and embrace spring. The time flew - walks, laughs sitting at the kitchen table, and hours spent with friends and family. All too soon, Dad dropped me at the airport for the return flight and the reality bell gonged. One hour delay. Vacation was OVER.
That was all right. I still had images in my head of fun times and good meals. The flowering trees inspired me to scribble some haiku (still tweaking them, David (my brother) ) and despite the annoyances of travel, there is a positive: permission to purchase magazines, books, and tic-tacs at the airport newstand. AT FULL PRICE. Hey, I'm captive, I'm delayed, and in theory, I was desperate.
I had mismanaged my reading during the week. Jeffrey Deaver's An Empty Chair proved riveting so rather than pace myself, I greedily finished it without a backup plan. Oops - hence the need to purchase reading material in case I was trapped at the Philly airport for days. True readers understand - at home I have a stack of books at the ready. I just didn't pack them.
An abundance. A plethora of print presented itself and I chose the latest Vanity Fair with Grace Kelly on the cover (her memory lives on in To Catch a Thief and Rear Window - yummy movies), a National Geographic Travel magazine featuring Italy's Amalfi Coast (hey, I might want to go there instead of back to DFW), and the book Shutter Island by Dennis Lehane (haven't seen the movie, but he's a great writer. How did I miss this one at the library?). Thus the return flight was painless. I could escape (except during thirty minutes of turbulence - can't read or write when we're bumping along) into others' words. Travel treats are worth every penny. When's my next trip?



Note - Pictures from the University of PA - Morris Arboretum. Glorious place to wander.