I am sitting in Richmond airport (RIC) at gate A8 awaiting my first flight to Philadelphia which connects me to Madrid and finally to my momentous destination of Geneva, Switzerland. A businesswoman brushes and re-brushes her silky black hair and pretends not to be nervous for something while she reads over documents—a meeting, probably, maybe a merger. A man in a suit paces back and forth on his cell phone; I can’t hear what he’s saying because I have on my noise-cancelling headphones (thanks, Mom) with Halsey as my soundtrack. By his relaxed posture and hand in his pocket, I figure the phone call isn’t all that serious—maybe his wife or daughter. He reminds me of Richard Gere (à la Chicago, not King David).
The airport is bustling on this Wednesday afternoon, but I feel nothing. My boyfriend remarked how surprised he was that I wasn’t more “weepy” when it came to leaving my family behind at the security checkpoint, but I honestly didn’t feel sad. Now before you nominate me for the Worst Daughter/Girlfriend/Person Award, I have concluded that this is simply my body’s natural Novocain shot to get me through the brunt of the trip. Like any good dentist, my brain didn’t want me to suffer through any pain (especially in a public place) so I got a healthy dose of laughing gas and I’ll come to after a few hours—which is true. I bet you anything there will be an all-out sob fest later tonight when it finally hits me that I will be without my loved ones for five whole months.
This is the longest and farthest I will have ever been from home, there have been hours of hard work and paperwork that have been leading up to this moment, I am on the precipice of possibly the most defining and exciting moment in my life, and I am knocked out in the dentist chair.