I’m flying at some ungodly height, watching the airplane wings bend and arc with a generous degree of flexibility, something I’d expect to see on an eagle, not on a steel and bolts jetliner.  Though, structural integrity is up for debate.  I’m surveying a questionable patch job on the fuselage now, grey gobs of putty appear to have been smeared over the critical engine/wing joint.

One more bump and we’re done.

We’re an hour in, well past the tragic possibilities of take-off, yet my hands still haven’t found their equilibrium, no less jittery now as I type. Could be the flying, could  be where I’m going, which is far, far away from life as I know it.

I’m headed to Bennington College in Bennington,Vermont, the alma mater of Robert Frost and the teaching post of some of the finest living writers, where I will spit polish everything I thought I knew about writing fiction.

Yep, today I’m officially a born-again student, an MFA student this time around. And for those of you as confounded by the acronym as the kind, graying couple seated next to me, it stands for Masters of Fine Arts, as in, I can now justify time spent in solitude puttering with words, plots and books. I’m legitimizing my lovely obsessions.

It gets even more fantastic: I’m gone for ten days. Add in two days of full-day travel and I will have been gone twelve days. Almost two weeks. Almost a Sinead O’Conner marriage.

Twelve Days!!! Warning: the following completely shatters my tough-guy, HAM modus operandi, but for reasons perhaps related to alien abduction and/or solar flares, I’m waxing maternal. Give me a moment; I’m almost done.

In twelve days the kids will have changed in ways I’ll be unable to pinpoint, but just sense. They will have amassed a collection of preschool crafts too large to fit in the MOMA. They will have given PAL every reason to seek revenge on my ass when I return home.

Did I mention PAL is steering the ship again? Bonus sex points: he’s taking a week off to shuttle kids, to pack lunches, to walk sleepy little gnomes back to their beds at 2 am.

He pulled through after my 7 solitudicious days in Durango and I know he will again.

Cue: Braveheart battle music.

To help keep things on track, I’ll be posting photographic reminder notes throughout my stay. Part “Stay the course, hon”, part “You are my Sunshine,” my goal here is to help him, help me, live out my lit dream.  And to keep the Funkhouse humming like these healthy 737 engines.

SUBLIMINAL NOTE #1

I’ll need your help, too; send him a care package. Wine in every shade of red would thrill him.

SUBLIMINAL NOTE #2

No, I'm not staying at the Overlook Hotel. It's my dorm room and I'm feeling so twenty-something.

Yep, now I’m all checked in. Wandered around the College’s Welcome Reception, wishing that stuffing cheese and grapes in my face would somehow ease the anxiety of knowing nobody, of looking like a first-timer. It’s eighteen-degrees outside and I’m wearing my down-stuffed, knee-length jacket in my room. The room is actually warm, but just looking out this old window and seeing nothing but naked trees flocked in white crystals makes me shiver.

It’s late here. Goodnight Funkhouse.