There are quite a few unique things about the Denver airport. I looked it up once.

The Denver airport is the biggest airport in the country, by almost two times, and is the third largest in the world.

There’s a blue stallion statue near the entrance that has sort of devilish eyes and it fell over and killed its sculptor while it was being made. There are also psychedelic murals throughout the airport, many showing crowds of people with strange faces and rainbow-colored clothes jammed in with jaguars and tropical flowers. On one, there’s a Nazi soldier in a wrinkly, pale gas mask, next to a letter from a little boy who died at Auschwitz. I don’t know why a painter would want to paint that. Or why airport staff would want to hang it on the wall.

The Denver airport is a weird airport.

Sometimes you’re in a strange gray place with even stranger paintings and statues and it feels like you’re in a horror movie and the painted people are watching you.

And then someone you love comes, like maybe your sister’s husband who the whole family is there at the airport to pick up, who your sister hasn’t seen in months. And then it’s him in his jeans and T-shirt and your sister’s arms wrapped around his neck being reflected in the shiny chrome walls, and in the reflection you see him bend down and give her pregnant belly a big kiss, and the rainbow-clothed people look happy, too, and even when you remember the horse statue out front it doesn’t seem so demonic, just a little mischievous.

It cost two billion dollars more than they expected to build the Denver airport. I think it was worth it.

Long Distance

A short while after our Historical Figure presentations, Talia left. Another person at the Denver airport, going instead of coming. Her grandma in Samoa was getting worse. Maybe even dying. So her whole family was spending a few weeks there. They were spending Christmas there. She wouldn’t be back until January.

It made me feel stupid for not inviting her over during Thanksgiving break. Or on a weekend. Why hadn’t I invited her over already? Now I wouldn’t be able to for the rest of the month.

Now I would be working on my plan alone.

Having Thomas home made everyone happy. He and Nonny stayed next to each other all the time, holding hands, talking, eating. Trying not to worry too much about work and money, from what I could tell.

Nonny said she was trying to enjoy the time they had before he had to leave again.

She said she hated long distance.

Doctor Who Was Right

Dad and I are staunch buddies, that is absolutely true, but there are a lot of ways we are very different. Dad likes to go on runs in the cold, early morning before he goes to school, and to me that sounds like the absolute worst thing ever. I can barely make a lap around the gym in PE. Dad’s hands are always moving, sketching, fiddling, and in his classroom he has some absolutely amazing paintings that look like Monet could have done them. Me? Nothing I draw or paint turns out looking like I intended it to. I can manage to mess up stick figures.