In the Airport Lounge at the start of sabbatical with Oxford in my eyes

I’ve always loved airports. Years ago, in my youth, my friend Ed and I used to make late night trips to LAX and watch the hustle bustle of people on the move. We would imagine what it would be like to go someplace foreign. Ed wanted to go to India but I always wanted to go to Britain.

All these years later it doesn’t seem possible that this is my 27th trip to London. I still am filled with a sense of wonder and anticipation after all this time. London does that to a person.

I worry about what I will find when I get off the plane. Things are different today and for me more complex that I can hope to understand. I want things to be simple again. I guess that is the true description of growing old.

But airports still get to me. I hope that never changes.

On this trip instead of taking the tram I walked from security to terminal E. A good hike but well worth it. In the concourse between terminal A and B there is this most amazing sculpture exhibit.

Hugh heavy piece of granite many inlayed with silver and onyx and all exquisitely carved in great detail. This is a showing that would be at home in any of the major houses. Yet here it is on the concourse between terminals.

If you don’t have a boarding pass you can’t get into the hall, I don’t know if anyone can just come in from the outside. I don’t know how they would get pass security.

But, the travelers with boarding passes are in such a hurry they all take the tram and zip by without being aware of what is on offer. As I walked through the exhibit there was no one else there.

The possibility for metaphor is staggering.