Leaving

Tomorrow I will wake up at 7 am. About three hours earlier than what I have become accustomed to.

I will double and triple check everything, convinced I have forgotten something. I'm sure I have, but hopefully it won't be something vital. Like my boarding pass or camera. Or underwear.

I will trek through an airport, mourn the loss of the really-good-muffin-place, and settle in for a three hour flight.

I will disembark into a new airport that I have only heard about. I will get on the subway and thank my father for doing so much research.

I am sure I will want to curl up and go to sleep and go out and run around with my camera like a crazy person.

I don't know what to expect. This is a city I have heard so much about, yet I really know nothing about it. I don't know the people. I don't know what it sounds like or smells like.

I only know what it looks like through other people's eyes. I have yet to see it with my own.

I have left much undone, here at home.

My bulletin board is half-full, waiting for me to print out all the pictures of smiling people and laughing faces.

My pictures are a mess. My camera rearranged its numbering system and I lost my editing program.

Yet tomorrow I will get in that plane and let go of it.

Someone else will, literally, be in control. I am there as an observer, to soak it all in. And to do that, I cannot remain attached to here. I can't be focused on my messy room while I'm in the city that never sleeps.