Love in the Age of Corona -- How I learned to stop worrying and just enjoy the collapse
Short fictional story:
So I imagine, after six months of monk mode and Intermittent Fasting, NoFap, Cold showers, lifting, etc and getting my rock hard six pack abs and having the confidence that comes with that, I then start dressing nice, and getting cloths that fit, adding accessories like fancy watchs, finally putting in the effort to look good and get a great hairstyle, and whatnot...
But mainly I book a long distance intercontentional flight to somewhere cool on the other side of the world/planet/earth. It is late summer time now and the Corona finally died off in most places around the world due to much warmer weather. My flight has many hops and is a multistop... I had saved up so much vacation time that I felt pent up and wanted to spurge a little by doing a last minute upgrade to get better seats but seems like other folks beat me to it. The traveling industry is finally coming back to alive in earnest again and its travel fever for a lot of folks worldwide. I can't check in online for some reason, oh yeah cause passport required.
I wait up early early in the morning and take a 3AM uber or lyft to the Dallas Fort Worth International airport, terminal E for international trips... get my TSA precheck and in the airport past security by 6:10AM While standing in line checking in I'm getting some snacks for a light preflight breakfast at the airport and spot this really hot "perfect ten" sort of "miss america" looking type of woman, in her mid twenties, presumably single , blonde hair, blue eye, light complexion , the works! My red-eye early morning flight gets called in the PA system, we start boarding, people making the usual mad dash to the ticket line/counter...
This perfect woman is on my flight, a Boeing 787 dreamliner, I feel all dreamy already... Unforntunately we aren't seated together, but I got a couple good glimpse at her and even maintained a few seconds of eye contact... she gives me a slight smile and then looks away. I'm not sure what to think of it. Long flight starts, they serve a small meal + drinks shortly after takeoff, then not long after the tinted windows all get autodimmed by the flight crew, most people take a nap but I read a kindle and put on some boise noise cancelation to listen to spotify.
Catch a couple more glances at "Miss America" while I'm half awake and half asleep, already having regrets not getting the row with the extra leg rooms... Finally after what seems like countless hours, plane begins preparations for landing, I'm out of my last 1Above flight endurance pill and the inflight satelittle wifi cuts off as the plane descends below 10000ft I layover someplace, perhaps tokyo, perhaps seoul, perhaps some other International city with an International airport.... But low and behold, increment weather or other issues has forced my next connecting flight to be delayed until the next morning....
It is very late at night now, local time maybe 1 AM or 2AM... and there is a sort of existential loneliness to it all, being lost/stuck/delayed at an major international airport late at night or very early in the morning in a megacity in a foreign country on the other side of the world... it somehow feels eerily strange and yet exciting at the same very time... It was a good idea that I cached the language data files in my google translator apk app on my phone and tablet prior to leaving home! Found out hard way last time that my phone was not unlocked and couldn't just get a new sim card. What floods over me is a mysterious combination of home-sick feeling, tired, and yet eager to get away and explore the unknown unknowns! Luckily this huge ass airport has a hotel connected to it, in fact like DFW, it has several nice hotels inside of the airport itself...
I need to get a night and proceed to the check in counter or customer service to get a room so I can crash for a few hours before having to get up in anticipation for my next flight... I feel the sudden jolted surprise of seeing the perfect lady yet once again in my peripherial view, such devasting beauty and awe-inspiring wonderment! Apparently I'm not the only one in similiar layover predicament, and through working up the courage for a casual chat I found out she is also stuck and headed to the same ultimate final destination. Due to this being holiday time and peak season plus the increment issues that cropped up last minute, there is only one remaining vacancy, and neither her nor myself had prior reservations... So.... I'm more than happy to offer her the last spot, and since there were plenty of other cheapskates that had merely taken it up upon themselves as to sleep on the airport floor rather than get a room, I didn't feel it would be too awkard nor embarrasing for me to do the same likewise. She being the perfect lady, of course is demure and insists upon not accepting the last empty room. After a couple back and forth attempts at mutual courtesy I decided to take the room , not wanting to pressure her into accepting anything, even if it was just a gracious gesture on my part with no other motives.
I get the paperwork handled and is finally handed the room keys, damn my legs are sore as fuck but for some reason I'm no longer sleepy anymore in that moment and decide to check out some of the night shops still open late night at this international longue of the airport.. Accidently come across her again, this time she approaches and makes chit chat, I forgot the topic of what, but its not important. I think it is her presence and ambiance that is so immersive and speaks more volumes than mere words could ever convey. I finally realized it is the way she looks at me, that kind of look.. unmistakable.
We go get a "midnight" snack together and continue talking, suprisingly she is also from the Dallas area and actually was born and grew up in DFW metroplex, talk about a small world after all! We realize we share much commonlity in terms of emotional sentiments and other philosophical values of life and existence. Somehow we get to talking about relationships and throw a bunch of hypotheticals around... call it vicarious empathy or whatever you want, but its self evident to me at this point our engrossing conversation at this late hour in this foreign place is just so flowing, so naturally effortless and real and these are the moments worth living for and waiting for and staying in... this sort of magical inner light... to be able to rest and abide in this essence of such a pervasive and timelessly elegant moment.. Then suddenly I catch myself blurting out partly in jest if she would like to come up with me to the hotel room to get some sleep/rest , immediately regretting making such an utterance, but to my absolute shock and suprise she accepts. At first I'm not sure if she is toying me and just playing along but then I don't detect any indicator of nonseriousness...
I realize most men spend their entire lives and never get a night like this, not talking about the sex, but really about being able to truly get close and wanted by a woman like THAT... by THAT kind of woman... that is something else rare and infrequent indeed As we meander across the halls and corridors of the airport to make our way to the hotel I have to secretly pinch myself to make sure I'm not somehow dreaming, and in that moment I immediately stop, realizing just like how Colin Farrell character must have felt during the end of Total Recall, when he no longer cares if this world is real or fake, just that the only things remains that matters is the raw experience itself, be it illusion or reality, the experience is what matters mosts. We share a few long moments of contented silence as we traverse the long airport walkways on long stretches of the moving escalators I'm hoping it doesn't get akward and my mind flashes back to the hotel scene with Captain America courting his new found lady friend in Before We Go (2014) It is truth that sometimes reality IS actually stranger than fiction, because as movie scenes run through my head, I realize it dawned upon me that even Already Tomorrow in Hong Kong (2015) was more nuanced than this...