ConSynPro

The Games begin. The alarm goes off at 2:30am. I’m leaving in forty-five minutes. I get up immediately, slipping on the stairs and scraping my elbow. Two minutes in. I next wrap my things into separate kits, each sealed in a plastic bag. All of them are stuffed into the duffel, except some packages to mail and my computer, to carry in hand. I feed Paco the dog and say ‘goodbye;’ tell him I love him… I may never see him again. I’m fretting a bit, checking each room twice or three times, realizing as I leave, so I leave all the evidence. Of what I’m not sure. Of bedding half-washed, food uneaten, a stack of pennies, and an overflowing heap of beer bottles and pasta sauce jars in the recycling bin. My cellphone vibrates. It’s the driver. He’s ready. I grab my bag and take the key off the table, going out back and locking the door from outside, then hiding the key. I go out the gate, closing it shut with the special slam I’ve learned from living there for a month. There. I’m on the road, all my belongings on my back. I come around to the front, and see the van waiting with its lights on. The driver is friendly. He wonders where I come from, and tells me I’m the only one riding tonight. I give a last look up at the house, and throw the duffel into the back. We’re off, in the dead of night, for SeaTac. The driver likes the night shift - he sees a shooting star. He likes astronomy, and we chat the entire drive. He’s curious, and asks the standard travel questions - I throw off my answers a bit; I don’t want anyone knowing too much. Still I tell him too much - I’m interviewing; I’m flying; to Europe; to Burning Man. He instructs me about the web booking system to let me know how to avoid arriving two hours before the Anacortes shuttle departs. I say I have errands to run but could have had another hour of sleep. The next bed I see will be in Oporto. That’s three days away. I may as well start taking those ‘Ben Franklin’ catnaps in airport chairs. I set my phone alarm to go off every four hours, indicating times to take a fifteen minute nap. My eyes close.