Denver

It must have been in primary school that some wise educator decided I needed to see 'Hemo the Magnificent,' an animated film about the human circulatory system.  I've forgotten the details, but the heart and arteries played a starring role, and who in Hollywood was intent on elevating blood flow to such an exalted place in the popular consciousness...that is what puzzles me and makes me think of the Gare d'Orsay.  Because one day you can be a vast Beaux-Arts shrine to progress, and trust me, that's what the world's first electrified railway was...and the next day you can be a Paris museum...and the whole thing starts in public consciousness of...that is what I'm trying to work out as I stare at cavernous Denver Airport.

Salu is pushing me.  She is pushing me in a United Airlines wheelchair, because I have unwisely surrendered my own electric one, thinking that I had little time to change planes here.  Though this thinking was wrong.  I have time enough to finish a novel, reading one that is, stare at the distant ceiling and wonder how these little birds got indoors.  They are flying around the United Airlines counters, oblivious to departures or arrivals, and short on food, one would suppose, although this is clearly not true.  In fact, there is so much to eat en route to Houston or Bangladesh or wherever all these thousands of people are headed, the indoor bird population can only swell.  I am sure these trapped birds have been the subject of staff meetings, press reports and advice from consultants.  They give the place an authentic feel, and they are not pigeons, so I say, let them stay.  There aren't many places where you can build a nest, stay warm, count on abundant popcorn and wing by CNN in your choice of bars.

And speaking of the Gare d'Orsay, which I wasn't, there are these long threads that thematically link this boarding lounge with...well, I don't know.  What I do know is that Salu has pushed me to the nearest disabled restroom, and has waited outside while I have a rest.  Fortunately, I also take the opportunity to pee.  For moments later, Salu pushes me to the San Francisco gate, where I have two entire hours to work it all out.  Because the thing about the Musée d'Orsay is that it makes you think about the thing that was contained in the thing that is.  Paris is still the capital, but the world's first electrified rail line apparently terminates somewhere else, and all that's left is the celebration in magnificent decorative stone, lofty and inspiring.  Because you just know that when your nation discovers how to make trains zip along electrically, you have something to be damned proud of.  Something that deserves a monument.  You can feel it.  The nation's lifeblood is flowing a little more smoothly, proudly and quickly.  And this railway station beats like the nation's heart, your Hemo the Magnificent, and historically it is too early to make much of a film, so architecture will have to tell the story.  And a grand story it is.

And remains.  It's just that the Denver version has so many other threads running through its fabric, that I get confused.  Maybe some facts and figures would get me in the right mood around all this airline activity.  Denver is the very center of the nation.  Air routes converge here with a vengeance.  The electronic sign announcing my flight to San Francisco reveals that the plane is actually a jumbo and shared by several airlines other than United, including oddly, Air New Zealand.  Salu herself hails from God knows where.  South Asia, I suspect, but I could be entirely wrong about this, having seen little of the world.  All I know is that Concourse B goes on for so long that it contains several postal codes and crosses at least two county lines, with a ceiling that in addition to providing bird sanctuary, could house all the aircraft currently outside in the snow.

One thread of the airline experience must be labeled fear.  Half the passengers on my flight arriving an hour ago from Des Moines weren't even looking out the window when tons of steel and aluminum slammed onto the concrete, vis-à-vis, landing.  This is nothing to be blasé about.  Same with take off.  Not to mention the actual flight experience post-9/11.  We are talking a planeload of denial.

Then there's the vacuity/inanity thread.  Just wander into one of the concouse bars and stare zombielike at Fox News or even CNN.  Or later, ask the off-shift flight attendant seated beside you why she plays a handheld video game all the way to San Francisco.

Fortunately, there's the human-connection thread.  It leads from the Hampton Inn across from Des Moines Airport where at 6:30 a.m., temperature freezing, two burly hotel guys stand in the November darkness staring at my wheelchair. 

I had been staring at the scene myself for days, knowing I had left a gap in my travel arrangements.  The hotel's van was not equipped with any wheelchair lift, of course.  But it seemed so close.  Less than a mile from hotel to airport terminal.  Surely there was a way...because, despite phoning in advance, there was no roll-in shower at my Dubuque hotel, and the appropriate room here in Des Moines had been booked...so what was there to do but...stare at a couple of Midwesterners who were staring at me.  Not saying anything yet.  Until I broke the ice, crystals of which were already forming on the hotel shuttle van's windshield.  Well.  Perhaps they could lift me into the van, then lift the wheelchair in as well -- assuming there was room and a door wide enough. 

And then with little effort and careful instruction regarding my wavering balance, I got one foot up on the running board, prayed that I wouldn't slip while the hotel guy tilted me back onto the passenger seat.  And, seconds later, slamming doors told me the wheelchair was inside.  Approximately 1 1/2 minutes later the shuttle driver pulled over to talk to a policeman sitting in his patrol car at the airport entrance.  'Hi, Stan.  Could I drop off a wheelchair at the terminal?'  A nod from the cop.  And 45 seconds later the airport transfer was history.

With a direct thread running to Salu, my next dance partner in wheelchair performance art.  Grab under my right armpit and pull me forward...a command that is designed to be short and sweet and unequivocal.  Salu pulls me as directed, then crouches as though bracing for a crash.  Having bent her knees and clinging to my arm for dear life, I cannot straighten my legs and achieve the height required to walk.  I know what Salu wants.  She wants me to walk like Groucho Marx whom, with each passing year, I resemble more and more. 

I tell her to stand up.  Salu understands this to mean that I am in even worse physical peril than imagined, causing her to bend over, crouching even deeper to absorb the impact of my inevitable fall.  Up, up, I tell her.  She looks alarmed.  One of the flight attendants intervenes, showing her what to do, taking my arm and assuring Salu that I will be okay. 

Which is really the strongest thread of all, the one of human care which has woven itself throughout this airline morning.  The ticket clerk in Des Moines shuffled around some seat assignments, and once her fancy footwork was completed, I found myself heading for Denver in FirstClass.  And even there, in the vast moon station outside the Mile High City, the United clerk pulled off a switcheroo, landing me in some sort of Economy Plus Leg Room Class.  I didn't ask for any of it, was grateful for all of it, and found myself relieved, at the end of the day, to be home.