Musing on the Mediterranean - Part 1
Week 1 - Temps Perdus? Mon., May 28. Later, NYC … Nearly 90 degrees this afternoon. Crawling on the A train to JFK. Arrive almost 30 minutes later than my rendez-vous time with Giacomo. Checking in at American Airlines requires a labyrinthine, multi-step process, further complicated by some mysterious unattended baggage. This ownerless duffel has the power to make scary looking Security cops have everyone exit the terminal. What follows is 15 minutes of chaos as the initially small crowd on the sidewalk outside grows into a hot, harried, time-pressed mob shuffled from line to line by clueless and confused airline personnel. Giacomo and I slip into the 1st class area, check in, and proceed to the security checkpoint. Air travel used to be glamorous; now, thanks to 9/11, it has become what its Latin root implies: travail , or work. Miraculously, the flight takes off on time with us in it. I’m seated one row in front of th...