Ohare to National

The airplanes belly has just left the ground, a feeling of weightlessness. As when you were a child and you jumped into your father's arms, expecting gravity to take its turn as it did when you jumped during hopscotch, but instead of your knees feeling the shock of a concrete impact you are suddenly lifted into an uptake, a wind beneath the wings. Chicago soon falls as we climb into the atmosphere. I wonder to myself what lies beneath us as I strain my neck to see out the small window, it would be convenient if the plane was clear so passengers could see the landscape falling underneath them and approaching as the plane lands. If this was the current reality, both places I have called home would be visible: Chicago and Holland Michigan.

The one located south of Chicago in a sprawling suburb. It is the place I called home for eighteen years, the place where I would return home after volleyball, basketball, or track practice and fill up a whole bowl of mint chocolate chip ice cream. The place where I planted a garden to be like my older sister and killed it from too much love, or water or not enough water.

Headphones slowly slip off of the man in front of me as his wife nags at him, half listening to his wife. His thinning hair wont be able to take much more abuse as he readjusts his headphones. His hair will fall out by the plastic rubbing back and forth if he listens to more music and if he listens to his wife there isn't much hope for his hair either.

My other home is across the lake in Holland, Michigan. I live south of the downtown there too. My family has always been connected to the Holland area. I wonder if my aunt and uncle had not chosen to live in holland a long time ago if I would hace ended up there to go to college at Hope. My summers on the boats and holidays snuggled into a warm house surrounded by snow, painted holland in a favorable light.