A Word for Love

I sat down next to "Love" in an airport bar. I found it annoying when she leaned across me to plug in her phone, but I held my tongue. It is always best to hold your tongue when you meet someone in an airport. I mean they could be anyone, right? And besides, the banter is always the same. “Where are you going? Where have you been? Oh, I love it there! Did you go by the Park/Museum/Cathedral?” When she leaned in I noticed that she smelled of the same coconut, hotel shampoo that I had used that very morning. A crazy coincidence, huh? That "Love" would stay at the airport Hyatt Regency?

But of course, I did not know she was "Love" at the time. I mean, you seldom do know right away, do you? For God’s sake, who would guess that it was "Love" drinking a tall, amber ale sporting a perfect, television-commercial-worthy, frothing head at 7:10 am? Of course, that should have been my sign that this was indeed “Love,” but I am not that smart. It only made me thirsty.

I asked the bartender, a dark-haired, thick bodied, Mediterranean woman with an alluring birthmark between her cheek and lip, for one of whatever it was “Love” was drinking. Of course, I didn’t say “Love.” At least I don’t remember saying it, but it was early, and “Love” was attractive in a 1977 Sally Field kind of way, so I might have said “Love” unintentionally. She turned to face me when I ordered my beer, raising the possibility even higher that she could be “Love,” as her roundish, cutesy face now wore the most curious make-up; a Jokeresque smile painted in blondish foam across its upper lip. I even began to hope and suspect at that point that she might be “Love.” In fact it occurred to me that I should ask for her autograph, and possibly even her number, as neither my mother, nor my buddies back home would ever believe that I had found “Love,” or that I could have ensured the ability to find her again.

As will happen in an airport she drank her beer quickly, and I mine. She leaned across me again to retrieve her phone. This time I didn’t find it nearly so annoying when she leaned over me, as her free hand accidentally laid itself across the top of mine. I noticed that the hand didn’t wear a ring. “Excuse me,” she stated matter-of-factly. It was only airport curtesy, not the real thing, but I didn’t mind.

“Love” picked up her bags and started away, but then she stopped. She turned completely around to face me, a dejected look on that sweet face. “I had hoped you would at least say hello!” Then she disappeared into the moving river of bodies headed toward the “C” gates.

"Love" did not speak to me that day in the airport bar, only a beautiful woman, a stranger. She did not say what “Love” should have said, what “Love” could have said... not if she had wanted more from me, that is. I know that sometimes “Love” is over-rated and, in any event, I was unprepared for “Love” at that time in my life. I would move on fine without her. But on the plane ride home I remembered her frothy smile and her soft touch, and I wondered that “Love” had only wanted a little small talk from a stranger, only a “hello”. The memory of it sat heavy on my heart. Outside my window was the blue sky, and it made a blue flight all of the way home, a very blue flight knowing that the same blue sky carried “Love” toward someone else, someone somewhere who might simply say, “hello”.