Back dating number dois - over the expanses
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We stayed at a pet friendly (really nice!) hotel in Baltimore, MD. We arrived and waited too long for our shuttle. The driver was perfect. Retired. Friendly and reassuring. He understood what was about to come. He took us to our room and then drove Josh and the tallest to a Chic Fil A to grab dinner. They came back to feed us the last of those fries we'll taste for a while. I savored every last bite. I let Rita out of her cat carrier. With wild eyes she darted and hid, peered around corners and took in smells. She found the mirrored closet door and stood in a stand off with her puffy tailed, arch backed reflection for a good 20 minutes. Turning slowly away and then whipping around again to be sure that intruder wasn't coming after her. The comic relief of her idiocy was welcome. The man of the house and I laughed hard, but quietly as Judah slept just on the other side of the mirrored closet door. We flopped into bed, exhausted. Everyone slept nearly 10 hours.
I started breakfast with the boys downstairs as Josh helped pull our hoards of luggage out of the back office where they'd kindly kept it for us. We ate quickly and laughed as Judah remarked, "You know, I'm behaving REALLY well in the Azores!" as he looked around the hotel food court. How anti-climactic for his poor confused brain.
We facetimed in the USO with family, one last time. The boys played, oblivious, and we ate plenty of the free snacks. We boarded the giant flat nosed shuttle to our rotator as Elijah said, "I don't think this plane is going to fly very well. There are no wings." We laughed as the people around us remained unchanged in emotion - all well seasoned in 5 hour leaving the United States flights. 40 seats were available, 38 were filled. We watched as land disappeared and nothing but tiny whote caps were visible. And then just nothing. Naps came and went. Time was suctioned out of the cabin with all the normal smelling air. The human vacuum slowed in descent. We circled around, seeing several of the other islands during altitude loss. Incredible beauty. Wonderment. Surreal, all of it. 3:30 our time, 8:30 our NEW time. We all 38 crammed tightly onto a shuttle to the arrivers room. There we waited as each group of people were stamped onto the island and exited through the doors. The lady behind the window pressed her stamp quickly on each passport and we opened the door to a crowded room full of clapping and cheering greaters - all the higher-ups in command on the base. Their smiles, genuine and warm. Knowing. Understanding. Ready to help hearts. Flooded with handshakes and hugs from unfamiliar faces and a few familiar names, we watched our luggage circle round and round the belt. I was shooed away after hoisting a large bag off the conveyer belt. There's no sense in the pregnant belly lifting things. It took two minivans to drive our luggage to our house. Our house that was furnished and waiting for our wiped out bodies. The house where we'd live for the next many many months. I rode in a haze. Not sure what to take in and what to just wait to see until later. Turned around, hurting, utterly exhausted.
Perception is not reality. It was all strange. Not like the pictures I'd seen, or the videos. Not bad different, just different. Different proportions. Different feelings. The excitement was gone. I wasn't looking at this house from my home in Florida. In Valparaiso, FL. I was looking at this yard, this house from inside this house. The place we are supposed to call home now. The place that held mystery. That beautiful house in the Azores. It didn't feel beautiful now. Not tonight. Beautiful was being filled ith someone else's stuff back in valparaiso, fl.
Our luggage was unloaded and we were left alone in the house. We poked around, timid and tired. Looking around corners and in closets. Confused about light switches that turned on unreasonably dim lights, and no door knobs. Joel wandered from my side to head downstairs. That railing hadn't been blocked be safety netting like all the other upstairs rails. The top step 10 feet from tile floors. His foot slipped and he rocketed through the railing. I screamed and Josh leapt out to scoop him to safety. Just in time. He screamed in his Daddy's arms, a petrified look on Josh's face. My chest heaved more painful tears as I buried my face in my hands. Joel reached for me and we stood weeping at the top of the stairs - too spent to move. We cried about everything the rest of the evening, me and that precious boy. We'd had enough. It was all just too much. He wailed for me in his bed in that strange room, with strange new sounds and smells. He wailed for me until his heaving chest gave in to soft whimpering, sleeping breaths.
The night was restless. My tears wouldn't stop, my eyes swelling tighter and tighter. The man of the house took my hand and led me to our deck. That deck that wraps around three quarters of our house. That deck that gives us view of all God's glory in this place - the rolling, green, cow dotted hills. The crashing waves. The strange new trees. A nocturnal island nester flew by and we laughed hysterically at it's ridiculous sounding song. Like a drunk hiccough or the cackle of some unrealistic cartoon movie villain.
I woke early in the morning. No concept of time. The sun was rising. I ran to get the man and we stood a few minutes out on that deck to watch it peak over the water, my eyes nearly too swollen shut to see. Our bodies confused. It was barely past midnight for our rhythms. We watched for a few short moments and then fell back to bed, not caring about anything but sleep.