lines

We're conditioned to stand in line for things. It must have been one of those genetic traits integrated into the human genome through generations upon generations of civilized evolution. It's all about the survival of the species, see. If you broke out of the line and tried to cut in front, you got sent to the back of the line, or people hurt you; either way, you didn't get dinner. The people who didn't have the smarts to stay in queue all the way to the buffet table didn't get fed, and the people who didn't get fed, weren't strong enough or buff enough to date or rape fertile, bouncy women with wide hips and overactive ovaries, and therefore removed themselves from the gene pool.

Nowadays, we can look at Disney footage of lemmings piling in torrential floods over the edge of cliffs, feel a sense of superiority, and think, "There but for the grace of a few anal-retentive line-monkeys with clubs, go us."

We like lines. They give us a sense of order, of purpose. They give us a place to stand and a space to take up in the great scheme of things. We become part of a greater mechanism, and that makes us feel important.

This, in case you're wondering, is how I'm justifying having voluntarily stood in line for the random luggage security check line at Sea-Tac airport for an hour and a half, despite not having been told by the ticket counter that I'd been selected for a random luggage security check. It was a line. The woman two customers ahead of me had been told to go to the line. Damnitall, I was going to stand in line, too. Why should she get special treatment when my money was just as good?

I started at the back of the line and worked my way to the front in half an hour. Then, because my checked-in luggage hadn't yet shown up at the random luggage security check and people behind me were being called up to be present while their baggage was opened by security personnel, I left the line and started over again at the end.

Three times.

It took me a while to figure out that Sea-Tac security personnel weren't interested in searching my luggage. Want to know how I found out? The third time through the line I finally worked up the nerve to ask someone.

"Is this . . . does all luggage come through here?"

The ten-foot tall official in an Alaska Airlines uniform stared down at me from a great height. "Not all," he boomed. "It's a random check. Did the ticket counter tell you to come stand in line?"

"Oh," I said, in a very small voice, and waddled away. Shame-faced and only a little bit embarrassed at having stood in line for an hour and a half for no good reason, I plodded to my gate.

Shut up. I was doing my part for the greater safety of the American airways.

It was nice being picked up at the airport. Nicer still being picked up at the airport by the Guy.

Nicest of all, seeing him again.

My mom, ingenuous troll woman that she is, said innocently the night before, "I'm glad that you have someone to meet you at the airport when you go back to California. This is the first trip you haven't said how much you wished you could stay."

"Uh," I said, wittily.

Her eyes opened very wide. "Do you suppose Masako and John will get married soon?"

Enough of that.

We spent New Year's night at a party hosted by two of the Guy's friends, an energetic pair that both possess that unique gift of being able to warm a room just by being in it. As the permanently, divinely ordained designated driver -- in short, fiercely allergic to most kinds of alcohol -- I drove the Guy home.

I spent the first five minutes of the drive home taking driving advice from the tipsy guy next to me. Yuhri isn't much of a deep thinker.

Like my birthday, I always expect some sort of change to sweep across the world whenever the New Year starts. I don't know what sort of difference I expect to see or feel; a miraculous uploading of information to my brain, maybe. A sudden shift in perception, or an epiphany of global proportions to set things right and change the human condition.

Every year I'm disappointed. I'll keep hoping, though. Maybe there's a fuse blown in Heaven, and that's why it didn't happen. They'll get it fixed by next year.

For all of you out there, I wish you the best in 2002. Let's hope that it's better than 2001.

Akemashite omedeto! Posted by yhirata at December 31, 2001 11:05 PM