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18 August 2023 - Moissac
Today started too damn early as I woke up just before 2AM with Reisefeber. Well, I was having I nightmare about lions, but now it's Paula my dog that I can't seem to protect rather than my children. They're all adults beyond my protection. And I'm leaving Paula behind for weeks as I head out across southern France toward Spain along the Camino, which here is called Via Podiensis. I laid there for a while but the lions kept coming back so I pulled out my phone to play Sliding Seas, the latest silly little game that grabs my attention. I was trying not to bother Iwona so I didn't turn on the light, but I didn't succeed so she went to the other room to escape the lions. Paula was safely under the bed with Eddie though. And Sliding Seas did its job of lulling me back to sleep, only to be reawakened just at the cusp of slumber by the buzz of a mosquito in my ear. And my smacking the pillow next to my head futily. This sequence of events recurred several times and I really should have turned the light on to read, but hinsight it always 20/20. I never caught the mosquito and eventually got up at 6 to take a shower.
Bus to the train to the tram to the airport was then my morning, mixing with commuters on the way the office one last time before the weekend. Arriving at the airport I got in line to check my big hiking backpack and wrapped it in cellophane. Then they told me it was too big for check in 3 so I had to go to check in 1, carrying the bg by the frame rather than the straps on my shoulders because they were fimly wrapped in cellophane. But check in 1 wasn't quite right either and after waiting in line I had to take another trek to bulky items check in. But finally and very sweaty I handed it off and went through the short security line to my gate. I always allow myself to buy a book in the airport now, so I picked up one on Africa. I packed way to many books for this trip already, so one more won't hurt.
I had a stop in Frankfurt along the way where I enjoyed a Currywurst and a Bier for lunch. This act has a lot more meaning than one would suppose, because I posted the same to Instagram on the way home from a work trip to the States in 2019 and my parents referenced it as evidence of my moral depravity in the letter they drafted for Cara to help her take the Maxwell & Zara away from me. It failed, but in the end it was my own stupidity in signing an agreement with no date for the kids to live with her until we returned to the US where she pushed me out. No date meant she used the agreement to stay in Norway dishonestly and keep the kids away from me for the rest of their youth. My own parents' part in this is one of the most painful things that happened, and my mother recanted and apologized when she needed my help with dad only to return to ostracizing me after his funeral. Cara is more of a daughter in her eyes than I am her son.
The freedom given to German children is ever amusing though. I am currently watching a little girl by my gate repeated run giggling the wrong way down a moveable walkway. On the way here I saw a carryon bag riding another walkway alone before I spotted its owner: a boy racing alongside with who triumphantly waited for it at the end.
Toulouse is just France. Across from me is an elderly couple where the man has a blue moustache and the woman is of African heritage. Behind them is a tourist dad with two kids. They have French hats. They have French books. They're drinking directly from the flask of table water. There's an older Italian woman alone ane trying to hard to be sexy. A tall, hairy bodybuilder is eating a salad in a wifebeater and gold chains. Somehow there's a trashy American Tinder couple. She's fat of course and he's a beanpole with glasses. Then there's the (Arab?) immigrants with empty coffee cups arguing.
