home…what a foreign concept to me these days. i’ve been “home” in my new place in LA for over a week now. honestly i still feel like i’m on vacation at the beach or something with all the sun and the amenitites. i mean, dishwasher, washer/dryer and walk-in closet seem like total luxury to me. (i apologize to all my nyc friends, don’t mean to brag or make you turn green)

if it makes you feel better, sunny LA gave me a less than warm welcome. upon arriving i discovered that my guitar had been badly damaged on the flight (thanks to the folks at America West who forced me to gate check it). that was the icing on a bittersweet cake, one that was mostly sweet but had some hidden bitter lumps i almost broke my teeth on. i took that a little far but you know what i mean.

it all started in the line to check my baggage in the Atlanta airport. i was in a glowingly good mood which is a highly unusual state for me to be in in an airport. usually i’m sleep deprived from having to get up at 4am to make the earliest flight out which not so coincidentally happens to always be the cheapest. or cranky from having lugged a 50lb suitcase, 20lb bag of CDs, my guitar in the hardcase and my laptop bag (which converts from bookbag to rolling bag in transformer fashion and singlehandedly allows me to carry this stuff all by myself) from the rental car drop off to the terminal. or sometimes my airport funk is because i’m sad about having to leave home or some place where there are people i love (isn’t that the same thing?).

so there i stood in line at the Atlanta airport, happy as a lark because i was going home to my new home in LA. i even chatted with some guys in line in front of me about the fact that i’m a singer-songwriter and i enjoyed it. i rarely enjoy conversations in airports that start off with some comment about my guitar, like “how about you play me a song little lady.” i’ve even had the pilot of my aircraft ask me that before as i boarded…sure gives you a lot of confidence in your crew. you can’t believe how bad some of the lines i get are. ladies, if you need some help picking up men just start carrying around a guitar as an accessory!

all was going swell in Kyler-land and the swellness was kicked up a notch when the guy behind the counter not only didn’t notice that my suitcase was over the 50lb weight limit by a couple pounds but decided to upgrade me to first class because he’s a big fan of musicians. what luck! now i’m beaming and i thanked him and tell him that this is a very good omen for my return to LA. jinx!

the fun continued as i headed to security screening. i got selected for extra screening as usual because musicians are subversive people but nothing could kill my mood that night. in addition to having the guitar as a conversation starter, i happened to be wearing my new favorite shirt which is a super tight baby-t that reads “i love nerds” across my chest. so the guys in security asked me all about why i love nerds and i admit that i’m a big nerd or at least used to be one or really still am one but i hide it better. they asked me what i do now and i told them i’m a singer-songwriter and before i blink they’re asking me to sing for them. real creative, i’ve never gotten that one before. but i was in such a great mood that i obliged and sang some lines from a couple of my songs and before i knew it everyone around me was clapping. at this point i was thinking to myself, “wow, i should be friendly in airports more often, this is fun!”

having found nothing threatening in my carry-ons, the security personnel wished me well and i packed up my bags and headed to the gate. my flight was on time, i found the perfect little joke trinket to bring home to my sweetie in the gift shop and i had all kinds of ideas of stuff to write to you in my journal on my little laptop on the cross country flight.

here’s where the sweet ends and the bitter begins. the gate attendant stopped me as i was boarding and informed me that America West has a policy of not allowing musical instruments on board unless a seat has been purchased for it and that i would have to gate check my guitar. there was no arguing with her, my southern charm had no effect, my inner bitch whom i let out for a moment had no effect either. in all my traveling this had never happened to me before. i reluctantly parted with my trusty road buddy and guitar of 6 years with a bad feeling in my gut. just after take-off i reached in my transformer bag to get out my laptop and my hands came up empty. my heart sank as i realized i left it at security screening, so distracted was i by all the attention lavished on me by my screeners. (damn ego will get you everytime) i spent the first hour of the flight facing the window with tears streaming, silently kicking myself for all the stupid things i’ve ever done. the flight attendant wasn’t very helpful as far as letting me know what to do about my lost laptop even though i was in first class and could have been a very important person with very important info on that laptop. who cares about more legroom when you’re 5’2” like me…i wanted my laptop back.

for the rest of my flight i attempted to finish a book a friend recommended and i started back in January: Hyperspace by Michio Kaku. it’s a modern physics book about the theory that our universe has more that 4 dimensions (3 space/1 time). nothing like string theory to take your mind off things. hey, i told you i’m a big nerd. the rest of the night was more annoying than anything else as the flight arrived over an hour late- at 2am CA time which was 5am east coast and my body time. i was so zonked i left my cell phone in my friend’s car who picked me up but thought i had lost it too until the next morning. i felt pretty pitiful but i didn’t know nothin’ about pitiful yet.

it wasn’t until the next day when i went to get my guitar to practice for a songwriters circle i was playing at that night that i noticed the cracks running along both ends of my case as well as some small chunks of the outer plastic of the case missing. i had been way too out of it the night before in my jet-lagged stupor to notice them. frantically i opened the case to discover that my guitar had a crack running on the front and the back was cracked all the way down and was starting to detach. *&$%#@*&$@)*!%)(^#@$@#*^$*)^$@%&()^%$@!@^_(*%%#@$************

*that* was my glorious welcome home to LA.

epilogue:
i ended up getting my laptop back, they had it in lost and found in the Atlanta airport when i called along with several others. apparently i’m not the only dummy they’ve encountered. and i’m currently fighting America West to get them to pay for my guitar. (my inner bitch is on standyby) keep your fingers crossed.

and btw, now that i’m settling in i adore my new home in California…

kyler

This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 23rd, 2004 at 7:51 pm and is filed under journal. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.