Taking Off

Travel to remember and anticipate

As I start packing for my month-long trip to Mexico, I think about all the trips my late husband, Kent E. St. John, took over the years.

I hate the term “late husband” (as if I am waiting for him to show up any minute). But what other nomenclature works in English? In Spanish, he is mi esposo fallecido. It still means dead.

Anyway, he was an expert traveler who always overpacked. I am trying to pack just what I need (maybe a little less even) since I’ll have a washing machine and my favorite Puerto Vallarta clothing store, Luisa’s. In my Notes app are my favorite restaurants and things to do while I am there, but visiting friends is always the best part of the trip. Today, it’s a balmy 39 degrees Fahrenheit here at home in upstate New York. The sun is out, which teases me into thinking it’s warmer than it is.

Planning for travel, and travel itself, can be exhausting. Early in my widow days, I decided to travel on my own. Kent had always made the travel arrangements. I messed up. Here is an excerpt from my working memoir, My Truce with Grief.

My mind was still so frozen, so stilted, that I screwed up the flights. The first time, I made my own travel plans, and I fail. That cheaper flight from New York to Cancun wasn’t just a red-eye. It was a ten-hour layover in Philadelphia. How could I have missed that? How could I be so stupid? The brain does what it can to help us, but when grief and depression strike, neurogenesis slows down. Tasks that were once second nature take a great deal of thought. How could I be this dumb? My brain was exhausted with grief.
I decided to slow down and think things through more carefully.

Even between time zones and airport shuttles, I have gotten much better at planning and packing. I still get an anxious little pit in my stomach in the days before I leave. Is my passport up to date? Did I pack my prescriptions? Do I have a hotel booked for the first night? Am I going to cry as I get on the plane, remembering all the times Kent and I flew together, knowing that I will always be without him?

“Life is about not knowing, having to change, taking the moment and making the best of it, without knowing what's going to happen next.” -Gilda Radner