So I guess I’m jaded now.
I was in St. Louis last week, my first time in that city – first time in the state of Missouri, for that matter – and I had a hard time mustering a whole lot of anxiety over the trip.
And, really, it should have been a thrill a minute. A trip to the second highest structure in Missouri in a Mork-from-Ork egg pod, a ride on a boat named after a character from The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, and an airplane full of toddlers — How much further on the edge can one woman live?
The flight on Southwest would have been enough to curl the hair of most travelers. A full flight and about 15 percent of the passengers were under 3. Knowing that on Southwest, passengers get to choose their seat, everyone else getting on the plane was straining their eyeball muscles, counting toddlers’ legs, and mentally measuring their proximity to the seatbacks in front of them. I strolled down the aisle until I found the cutest 2 1/2-year-old in the joint and sat next to him. Even his mother was shocked.
“I didn’t think anyone would have the guts to sit here,” she said. She doesn’t know me and my plot to get a cute baby in my life by whatever means necessary. Airports and train stations are an ideal place to fantasize about acquiring a baby. The mothers are usually so exhausted and can be easily lured away with the promise of a double Bloody Mary. Sure, Carson put his sticky fingers on my laptop keyboard, gave me an explanation about his Batman cape I couldn’t understand (I still don’t know what orda bris! means), and kicked my leg so many times I paid the $8 for in-flight wi-fi so I could Google hematoma. But I got my baby fix.
The next morning I set off for The Arch. I don’t necessarily love heights, but I didn’t want to leave St. Louis without going to the one thing it’s known for. I weighed my options: Risk a horrible, public death that probably involves everyone seeing my underwear and be known as the California visitor who was among those who died in the worst tourist disaster since the Hindenburg, or listen to people say, “You went to St. Louis and didn’t go up in the Arch? OH MY GOD!”
There was no question. I was going up.
My friend Barb told me it was like riding in a clothes dryer. “You should do it, though,” she said. “You need to live on the edge. Literally.” Ha ha. She’s funny, that one.
I was pretty worked up going into the line. Not because I don’t enjoy a nice ride in a laundry room appliance, but because I thought it was on the outside of the Arch and I would be tilted, looking out. I was reminded of going into the line for the Tower of Terror in Disney World, where I kept hearing conflicting stories about it being soil-yourself scary or I-napped-through-it boring. You just can’t trust people and you have to draw on your own neuroses.
“Is it scary?” I asked the lady who took my ticket. “Noooo,” she said. And then she paused. “Who are you with?” I told her I was alone and she gave me the first of several looks of pity that I got in St. Louis. Touristing solo is sad for everyone except the person who gets to walk at her own pace and stop for two lunches if she wants without anyone getting on her case about it. “Just keep looking across at whoever is sitting across from you. You’ll be fine.”
As it turned out, I was more than fine. I kept looking out of little window, waiting for that stomach-turning, heart-stopping view and it never came. I had pleasant, four-minute conversations with two families in my pod – from Iowa on the way up and Kansas City on the way down – but not because I needed the distraction; because they seemed like nice, Midwesterners.
The riverboat ride was further down the scale of thrills and excitement. By the time the narrator described a third bridge by when it was built (down to day of the week) and how many horse and buggies drove over it on the first day, I whipped out my cell phone and dared my fellow passengers to tell me to “live in the moment.”
I am living in the moment. This not-so-thrilling one.
I did get my blood pressure up once on the trip. Carrying two coffees up to our hotel room, while trying to slide my room keycard, one cup went crashing to the floor, splashing semi-hot liquid all over my clothes.
I really do love living on the edge.
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