Life is a destination. No. Wait.

I feel like I’m in some weird time warp and also, like I’m Laura Ingalls at the beginning of the Long Winter, with a sense of foreboding about the months to come. There’s snow on the ground and it’s cold, cold, cold. I dug out my thick woolly legwarmers and enormous warm mittens today, to take Barkley for a walk. It snowed all weekend, much to my dismay.

Friday my husband loaded up the van and took the boys and dog to my in-laws’ for Thanksgiving, eight hours away. It snowed or sleeted most of the way, but was otherwise uneventful. I had teacher training until late Saturday afternoon, so the plan was for me to fly out Saturday night, and drive back home all together on Monday.

Side note to say that Friday was the first time in years – I don’t even know how long – that I was all by myself in the house, without even the dog to keep me company. It was bizarre, not having anyone else’s schedule or needs to think of. Mind you, the days prior to that were a blur of preparing and packing and getting everyone else ready, but come Friday, I realized it was just me. I didn’t have to let the dog out, I didn’t have to feed anyone except myself. All I had to do was make it to class on time, and that’s it. It was a little surreal.

Another side note: since my husband took the van, I was driving his three-quarter-ton truck. Technically I could have taken his car, but the thought of it possibly getting dinged in the parking lot of the yoga college was too much to bear. I don’t think I could stand that kind of pressure. Plus, the snow had started and the plain fact of the matter was that if I – god forbid – was to get in an accident, being in the giant truck would be much preferable than being in a little sports car, on so many different levels. One of those levels would be that my husband would be much less upset if the truck was in an accident, than his girlfriend/ car. The other was that I felt eminently safer in the truck. You can’t hurt me, motherfuckers, you can’t even try, I thought to myself from my much-higher-than-normal vantage point. This is what driving a three-quarter-ton truck will do to you. I’m not excusing my behaviour, I am just stating a fact. You try it, and tell me it’s no different from driving a minivan. You cannot. I felt like one of those guys on one of those gold mining shows, but with much lower stakes. And less gold.

I will admit I felt a little strange when I drove it to the homeopathic dispensary. I mean, it has an elk decal in the back window.

I am pretty spoiled, on account of my nice van with its heated seats and its sharp turning radius and its keyless entry. Despite my newfound extreme driving confidence, I found myself feeling slighted at having to actually use a key to turn on the engine, like a barbarian. And the radio stations were not tuned to my favourite Hits of the 70s and 80s. However, those inconveniences paled in comparison to my new Don’t Mess With Nicole I Am Woman Hear Me Honk The Horn of This Big Truck kind of way.

I also felt slightly ridiculous in that I left a lot of extra time, in anticipation of the roads and traffic being awful with the snow, and it turned out there were no delays at all. I ended up at class a full fifty-five minutes early, so I sat in the cab of The Truck, pressing “Like” on all the Instagram posts that had cute animals and photos of food in them.

Saturday was even gloomier than Friday; the snow kept falling intermittently and, alarmingly, a fog started to creep in. It is hardly ever foggy here, being landlocked in the middle of the Prairies, but the fog indeed rolled in. The last time it was foggy I was also due to fly out of town, if you recall. All through class on Saturday I kept glancing out the window, where it was evident the fog was getting thicker and thicker. I kept checking my flight status app and all was on time, no delays. O-kay. I rushed home after class, caught a cab to the airport, sailed through security, checked again. Flight – on time. I sighed with relief and sat at the bar to order a glass of wine. No sooner had my wine appeared than my husband called, to tell me my flight had been cancelled.

Indeed, one check of my app and I saw the truth, updated one minute prior: CANCELLED.

Cancelled, and me with a full glass of wine.

Thirty minutes and 2000 steps later, I found I had been bumped to another flight, that was going through Edmonton. Edmonton! My one hour flight was now going to take much longer, but I would still get there. I sat down at the bar – again – and ordered a glass of wine – again – only to find out, ten minutes later that the flight to Edmonton was delayed and I now had a mere ten minutes to make the connection.

At least this time I had made a dent in my wine.

I trundled back to the gate, where I was chirpily informed that the plane hadn’t even arrived yet, and if it did arrive, I would hopefully still make my connection. “Hopefully” was not the term I wanted to hear, particularly since I had sent all my luggage in the car with the guys, and all I had with me was my makeup bag, a toothbrush, a hair brush, and my blow dryer. I was extremely unequipped to be stranded in Edmonton.

Too long, didn’t read; I ended up on the 8:05 am flight Sunday morning, which meant I had to grumpily get up at five after an anxious, unrestful sleep. The good news is that everyone was happy to see me, and we had a nice visit with a lot of people. I missed seeing my friend Sam (HI SAM) and I could have done without paying for three cab fares in less than twelve hours, but it’s all about the destination, not the journey, right? No? Oh.