My eyes open. I lift the shutter over the aeroplane window. We've entered Indian airspace. My heart skips a beat.
The plane taxis. Locks click as hand baggage is taken out and there's a frantic struggle to disembark. Queues extend like snakes at immigration. Passports are stamped, checked, and checked again. The luggage carousel moves tortorously slow.
My suitcase finally arrives. I load it onto my trolley and wheel myself out. Finally, finally. I'm pushing my way through the crowd, searching, seeking. I see him and our eyes meet. I smile.
The moment closes around me and I'm back to reality, wearing the scarf wrapped around me that I know I’ll be wearing when I meet my husband again.
And as I walk home from work in the indigo-blue darkness on Wednesday evening, it's the anticipation that keeps me going. The anticipation of the moment when we will be together again.
But it's ironic really. When the moment actually comes, it will inevitably end, quick as a flash. Once it's done, the memory will keep me going. I will store it in the back of my mind, ready to replay in my head as I fly back across the Indian Ocean, or walk the same streets after work in the indigo-blue.
Memories, unfortunately, live longer than the moment.
It's hard to wrap my head around this concept when I'm trying to be in the moment. Those happy, full, bursting-at-the-seams-with-joy moments. More often than not, it doesn't feel enough, to have just a memory of something.
That's why I often feel the urge to document the moment through art, or writing - and yet, trying to remember the details turns me into an observer of the moment, resulting in (you can guess it), NOT being in the moment.
Is there a way to be more present in those moments? To extend the time or to slow it down.
Or perhaps a mental archival model that allows you to permeate these memories deeper in your brain so they never fade?
These are questions I'm pondering towards the year's end.
P.s. I'll let you know if "the moment' turned out the way I expected it.
Lovely writing -- moments pass by in a flash. Especially those we treasure.