Above The Labrador Sea
You can plan the perfect multi-country itinerary. Score the best flight deals. Notify the embassies, “Hey...hey guys, I’m on my way!” Download every safety app out there. Heck, delete your real apps to free up space so you can download The App that will ensure you’re rescued by an English-speaking hunky medic in a late model ambulance and transported swiftly to the hospital that serves your coffee of choice where your primary care physician from the states happens to be volunteering in a medical exchange program. You can sew cash into your bra and practice washing your travel undies.
You can do all that.
None of it prepares you for the moment when the flight path monitor shows you over the Labrador Sea. Going 634mph ground speed. At an altitude of 37,000 feet. With an outside air temperate of -70 Fahrenheit. And a tail wind of 105mph. Heading for what appears to be a flyover on the tip of Iceland. Seeing all of this displayed on my nifty pilot personal dashboard in the seat back in front of me puts my mind in high gear.
First, this is like when fast food joints were forced to put the calories on their menus. Ordering the side of guacamole and chips suddenly became a really big calorie deal. Seeing the flight stats confirms: this is a really big travel deal. Second, the earth really is round. Well I’ll be damned. When I travel domestically I picture myself flying across a flat map of the United States. Buy me a ticket across the pond and you can just call me a convert. It feels so “globe-ular.” Third, why have I not heard of the Labrador Sea? When I land will I remember to Google Labrador Sea? It’s near Goose Bay. My focus on hunger and thirst and an obsession with not wanting to eat or drink in flight to mitigate having to use the Tiny Bathroom has shifted to images of geese and black labs frolicking in this mystery sea 37,000 feet down. This is a good time to read the info card on life preservers. Since I was lucky enough not to get a seat mate, I’m going to grab his/hers too.
I currently call the Pacific Northwest home, or at least it's where I store my suitcase between adventures. When we drive from Portland to the Oregon Coast there’s this midway point where you emerge from a tunnel and everything changes. It’s a magic tunnel. Pass through to feel instantly lighter, more carefree and more likely to wear flannel. Every journey has a magic tunnel. The Labrador Sea is that tunnel for me. I conducted my final 12-point inspection of my bag and left for PDX less than 15 hours ago, and this is the point where that time-space continuum gets all jumbled up. The things I was concerned about there have less meaning here over the Labrador Sea in the blackness of night.
I’m no longer planning for my big trip. I’m on my big trip. In about five hours I’ll land, alone, in Helsinki. I’m more curious than scared, but suddenly it matters not that I chose my indigo skinny jeans as opposed to my black skinny jeans. I’ll be the stranger in a strange land. I’ll be the little solo female traveler who acts like she knows how to breeze through customs at Helsinki-Vantaa Airport only because she’s actually watched YouTube videos of it for the past month. I’ll be bleary eyed but bushy tailed to get my people watching adventure on in the 60th parallel. That’s my new parallel record.
Until then, we’re making a beeline for Keflavik, an island. Mental note: also Google Keflavik. Could it be Iceland? I think maybe. I’m so excited to be on this journey that I don’t even want to sleep through the flight path dot changing in front of me. With 2,400 miles to touchdown I’m now going to force myself to put on instrumental flute music, break the sanitary wrapper on my flight blankie, close my eyes and pretend to sleep. I think that will just have to count tonight. 3,787 km to go. That equals 2,353 miles. Good thing I have an app for that.
(Written above the Labrador Sea – 2019)