Widowish: A Memoir(33)

On my way to the airport, I made a stop at a sandwich place that Joel had loved to go to when we were in Chicago. I went for Joel. But now I was late for my flight. I had never seen O’Hare so packed. One of the luggage screeners was broken, so the security line was taking an extralong time. I watched Jennie drive away, and started wheeling my bag to the end of the line when the tears started again. I stood in that security line and realized I would be there for two hours and my flight was leaving in one.

I noticed a gruff TSA officer pacing the line. His belly hung over his belt. His hair was thinning, but his bushy mustache made up for it. He was making sure that we, the travelers, were staying in line and following the rules. A few people were understandably annoyed. They tried to get his attention. Some of them, like me, were afraid of missing their flights. Others were simply aggravated by the bureaucracy of airport security. It was tense. I noticed all of this going on around me, but I just stood there crying. Bereft. Tired. Empty.

The TSA guy must have noticed me. He approached me with . . . the only word I can come up with is caution. I think he was afraid of a woman in tears. Not just tears, a flood on her face.

“Why ya cryin’ so hard?” he asked me.

I looked at him blankly. I saw him. I knew he was talking to me. But I couldn’t respond.

This had happened to me once before. Joel and I were on a ski trip with friends in Lake Tahoe. After a day spent mostly on my ass, attempting to learn how to snowboard in a blizzard, I had had enough. I had fallen one time too many and was done. I couldn’t move from weariness. Ski patrol had to come and get me and bring me down the hill on one of their little red sleds. Joel, of course, accompanied me down. He was worried. In all my years on skis, nothing like this had ever happened.

We got to the first aid hut. The nurse started asking me questions:

“Can you tell me what day it is?”

I heard her question, but I was too tired to answer. I stared at her blankly.

“Do you know where you are?”

I simply couldn’t talk. I felt Joel squeeze my hand.

“What is your name?”

I half smiled. It was the best I could do.

The nurse turned to Joel and asked, “Does she speak English?”

I began to laugh. What started out as a giggle turned into full-on hysterics. My entire body shook. I looked crazy. I couldn’t catch my breath from laughing so hard. I found that last question to be so outrageous. Do I speak English? Really? Am I that far gone? I laughed myself better. Joel couldn’t help but laugh, too.

“Yes, she speaks English,” he managed to say.

“Yes, yes, yes!” I said. “I can answer all of your questions. I just needed a minute.” I cackled.

“Thank goodness!” that nice nurse said. “You had me worried.” She started laughing, too.

Without Joel next to me, though, I didn’t think I could ever be me again.

I didn’t know how to respond to the TSA guy who stood there looking at me, cautiously.

“Ya alright, there?” he asked me again.

People were staring at me. I noticed the clock; my flight was now leaving in forty-five minutes, and I was nowhere near the front of the line. I tried to think of something to say. I needed help. I couldn’t miss my flight home. I took a deep breath, wiped my face with the back of my hand, and without thinking, said something I had never said before:

“I’m a widow.”

The TSA guy and I shared the same expression, which was: surprise. It was the first time I had said it out loud. The TSA guy, whose name tag said John, gave me the once over and I understood why. Out of all the things I could have been crying about, being a widow probably didn’t cross his mind.

“Jesus,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

“I need to get home to my daughter,” I cried.

“Of course you do. Come on.”

It’s possible, given my emotional state, that he thought I had just been widowed that day. I didn’t bother to clarify. John opened up a space in the rope and let me through. He reached for my suitcase, and I let him take it.

“Which flight you trying to catch?” he asked.

“To Los Angeles,” I told him.

He whistled. “Cutting it close.”

John led me through to the front of the line, easily passing a hundred other people.

“Ya gonna be OK,” John said as he lifted my bag onto the security belt for screening. I couldn’t tell if he was asking me or telling me.

“Thank you so much,” I told him as I walked through the scanner. “Really,” I said through my tears. “That was really nice.”

He nodded from the other side of security. He called after me, “Get home safe. God bless.”

I took that blessing. I felt it and luckily made my flight.

Back in LA, I called Jillian on the way home from the airport. She asked about my trip.

“It was great but terrible,” I told her. “I loved seeing Jennie but I cried the whole time. I missed Joel . . . But I figured something out.”

“What?” she asked.

“Are you sitting down?”

“Yes!” she said.

“Jill.” I paused. “Guess what?”

“What?” she asked.

Then I said it. “I’m a widow!”

I could practically see her take the phone away from her ear and stare at it. She either thought I was crazy or stupid. She knows I’m not stupid.