DAY – 1
It’s the last day before the first day. I have sixteen separate notes app entries that all read like this:
PILLS, GARDEN OF QUEEN, TIM DOCTOR LETTER PRINT TICKETS PASSPORT ALARM, NECK PILLOW BEYONCE BEYONCE BE ON THE DAY BEYOND THE DAY FUCK SIRI CANCEL SIRI CANCEL
These are a collection of all the times I’ve suddenly remembered something I had to do or pack while driving and entrusted Siri (derogatory) to take dictation legibly. I like to think my faith in Siri makes me a traditional fool, one who trusts and forgives lightly, not the kind to be devastated by scammers and other narcissists. That was until I married one. Now, I’m a fool with a past. But I just can’t quit Siri.
Now, I’m in a long distance relationship, so dictation is an attempt at actually writing down what I need to in my phone, instead of being lead astray by the stream of messages between us and forgetting what I had opened my phone for in the first place. LDR means my phone is my lover. It makes me come, suggests recipes, tells me her jokes to make me laugh while I cook and rolls over to tells me she loves me in the morning. It recounts the good and bad points of her day and writes SEEN underneath my recently sent messages so I know she’s just out of the shower. My phone is a handheld her.
As you can imagine, making a packing list has been a logistical nightmare. On my first attempt, I got my apps mixed. My list read as follows:
Socks
Chargers
Hand sanitiser
Black pants (linen)
Fuck me slowly against the wall
Jeans
Books
And sent “running shoes” to my fiancé in the middle of sexting. She thought I was trying out a new kink. It did not go well.
After this debacle, I tried buying a physical journal. Bricks and mortar. A hardback navy volume of 150 pages and matching pen, a display of teamwork that would be hard for an ex-netballer to refuse. But, as it turns out, I only ever remembered things to add to the list when driving or in shower and paper doesn’t float or car DJ well so I left the journal behind.
I told my fiancé I was putting her down for 10 minutes to get the list done and I’d read it to her at 1:40pm. I’m a goal-oriented lesbian. A lot of us are. As of 1:40pm, this was the list:
1. Not one but two menstrual cups, in case one gets lodged and will only come down if coaxed by a family member.
2. An enormous 300-page book with six pages left to read.
3. Nail clippers on a carabiner attached to my backpack, despite the fact that I’m a career biter and the fact that the clippers are metal mean they will absolutely get taken from me the minute we hit security.
4. Four pairs of no-show ankle socks that slip down and cause 10-day blisters on my ankle shins (otherwise known as Achilles heels)
5. Two full bottles of my new thyroid herbs which are an expensive placebo and most likely crushed grass clippings with a pill coating.
6. A single Australian > US travel adapter. I am also going to Europe but am quietly hoping that phones require less electricity there.
7. Tarot cards for when we are lost/miss a connecting flight/do ayahuasca and someone loses their way/temper/mind.
8. A rock from the beach walk my fiancé and I did before I left which I refuse to take out of my luggage, despite it being a literal rock.
9. A sock for the rock. A rock sock.
10. One of those sucking vibrators that doesn’t work for me but was gifted to my fiancé because she’s an influencer and I’ll be damned if I’m not committed to coming for free.
11. Toothpaste tube with one medium squeeze left.
12. The hope I will find everything I’ve forgotten to pack is freely available for purchase at the airport.
13. Even better, everything I’ve forgotten to pack is freely available for free as apart of a local radio station giveaway promotion.
14. Comb that gets stuck in my hair that gets stuck in the strings of my ergonomic neck pillow.
I’m a PA for my day job and I don’t want kids so this is the closest I’ll get to having to put the needs of someone else before my own. Her case is packed, documents printed, laminated and government sealed and vitamins itemised. I, on the other hand, haven’t changed the code from 000 on my self-locking suitcase because I was too busy laminating and sexting random items of clothing to my fiancé.
She calls in the middle of me trying (derogatory) to flick the code to 111 to tell me she’s eating minestrone soup for dinner. Now, as we all now, actively choosing to eat soup for any meal is the first sign of depression, so I had a job to do here. The list was abandoned once more.
3 HOURS LATER, I’m on the first flight. 1/3. I’ve got a middle seat but I’m in Economy X, baby! I’ve thrown some random shit in my suitcase and probably forgotten my passport but who cares, we’re on our motherfucking way, U-S-A!
I take out my phone to delete the list so I can glide over the memory of my more recent failures, pluck out my AirPod Pros and open Spotify. And I realise I’ve forgotten to download a single playlist. Not one carefully curated and faded track has made it. And all I’ve got in my offline library is the last song I played. The very last. For two hours. Make that 36. Fuck. Looks like it’s down to you and me, Lenny K.
I WANT TO GET AWAY
I WANNA FLYYYY AWAY-YY-YY
YEAH, YEAH, YEAH
Yeah.
TN
The thought of one “medium” squeeze is both tacit and oddly satisfying, for some reason 😂