Back in the Heat

So I survived the family reunion. I got to hang out with a good amount of family members and the next one is scheduled for two years away versus three in honor of my uncle's eightieth birthday. A big part of my apprehensiveness with the reunions is the fact that I have lived in a west coast liberal environment for so long and returning home brings back all of the rules and value system that I grew up with. Not a lot of my belief system today corresponds with the old. Still, each one ends up being a good time and my sister Kathy and I got to gab about Harry Potter. It is funny to watch everyone get older with each passing reunion. I am the youngest cousin of my generation and I will be turning thirty-four this year. Some of my cousin's children now have children and our family has four generations going strong. It is strange to watch your parents get older. Since I only have the opportunity to see my mom and dad once or twice a year, it seems that they age a bit between each visit. I cannot help, but think that I will be their age in another thirty years and how quickly time passes. Day to day life is so busy and time passes so quickly, it is an important reminder to try and enjoy each day and each moment for what it is.

So following the reunion, I traveled to Louisville, Kentucky and met up with a good friend of mine from high school. Her husband is a pastor of a small Christian church and they run the church together. They have recently completed an expansion of their church and Rhonda did the interior decor. It is very beautiful and they have put a lot of work into the project. We had lunch at a very nice cafe and then they took me on a great tour of the city. I had visited Louisville several times during my flight attendant days and was pleasantly surprised to remember some spots. We also got to see Churchill Downs, which was quite impressive. It was hard to believe, but I last saw Rhonda six years ago at our tenth high school reunion. I could not believe it had been that long. It was great to see her and George and I am so pleased we have remained friends over the last few years.

I drove to Dayton, Ohio and overnighted there. I spent the entire next day at the National Air Force Museum located adjacent to the Wright Patterson Air Force Base. The museum is spectacular, taking up four large aircraft hangers and it has the largest collection of aircraft I have ever seen. Everything from early Wright Brothers aircraft to the 707 Air Force One that carried President Kennedy's body back from Dallas to the prototype of the new F-22 Raptor fighter. I was not able to see everything and I could easily have spent two or three days there. There is so much to see and it is all beautifully displayed.






After spending the day at the museum, I proceeded east to Pittsburgh, PA. I spent a year attending the University of Pittsburgh (Pitt) in 1993 and it was nice to get back and check things out. The campus has not changed all that much. There are a couple of new buildings and a new Athletic center, but everything else I remember is still very much there. I had worked for the admissions office as a tour guide and my tour around campus this trip brought back a lot of memories. One reflection I had was how much I have changed in the past fourteen years and how little thought I had given to where I would attend college. As I look at my life now, I am definitely a city person. Living in a rural environment or someplace where I cannot explore and discover new things consistently is murder for me. My borderline ADD kicks in and I get very bored very quickly. When I was researching schools, my top choices were the University of Iowa, Catholic University in D.C., and Pitt. Iowa? Yeah, I likely would have committed suicide attending there. D.C. is a great city and this probably would have been the best of the three, but Catholic is a small liberal arts school and I am not sure how successful I would be in that type of environment. I left Pitt because I felt like I was not accomplishing much and wasting money with no clear direction. I came home and threw myself into the travel business, which was a wise move. Once I eventually made it to the airlines, I truly got in touch with who I was as a gay man and what kind of a person I wanted to be as a global citizen. So the young man that I was fourteen years ago was strongly on my mind as I toured my former haunts.

I also drove around the city a bit, taking in the Strip district which has some small cafes, coffee shops, foreign grocery stores, etc. I headed to my airport hotel in the late afternoon and crashed out in anticipation of my morning flight the next day.

The current airport terminal that Pittsburgh uses opened while I was attending school there back in 1993. It still ranks as one of the best airports in the world in my book. It is exceptionally well designed and the airport has basically a full shopping mall and a variety of restaurants to choose from. From an aeriel view, the airside structure is built in a large X shape and the tram system drops you off in the center. This ingenious design ensures that no gate is too far away. Sadly, US Airways chose to shut down their hub their last year. Southwest and JetBlue have both moved in and I hope that another airline will move in with a strong presence to keep the airport and the local economy going. So I headed to the airport Thursday morning and headed to my gate after grabbing something to eat. As I headed to board my flight, I threw out the wrapper from my sandwich and my Invisalign trays along with it! Nice. I am on my ninth set out of eighteen, so that is not too bad. At least it took me six months to throw out a set. My dentist assures me I should have the new set next week.

I arrived in Phoenix and a 100-degree day. It is an unusual summer here because it is humid. People always talk about that dry heat that Phoenix is famous for. "Yeah, it may be 115 but it is a dry heat!" is what people always say here. Not this summer. My visit is a late birthday surprise for my friend Christi. She was sitting out on her balcony chatting away to me on my cell phone while I was frantically trying to get her attention from down below. Finally, in frustration I threw a penny up on her balcony to get her attention. It was a great moment. I had told her I was headed for New England, so she was not expecting to see me until November. I am spending the weekend here catching up with my posse of friends here - Rich, Christi, Kat. It is nice to be back out west and in familiar food territory. Jamba Juice, Rubio's Tacos, I am home!

Hope you all have a great weekend. Back in San Francisco Tuesday night. Cuidate.