In Miami, I had to get my backpack and recheck it in order to go through customs. When the female half of the Jersey couple I'd been chatting with saw how small it was, she nearly fainted. "Turn away!" she said, as her own set of large suitcases came off the conveyor belt. "I'm embarrassed! I only traveled for 2 weeks!" I laughed, and we said our goodbyes. I spent my 5-hour layover stretching and lying on the floor with my feet on a chair to counteract the effects of prolonged sitting and compression. Sure, I got some funny looks, but I had long since gotten over being stared at for my anti-DVT measures.
My flight to LA was largely uneventful, but it did solidify my belief in the need for pacifiers on airplanes. See, pacifiers used to be de rigueur, but they've fallen out of fashion. Fine. Who am I to contradict the latest childcare studies? But when the kid is under two years old and on a plane, give them a damn pacifier or something else to chew on. For one thing, no one on the plane wants to hear your kid scream and wail all through the flight, particularly on a red-eye. And more importantly, the poor child's ears are popping, and the scream results from the pain and from not understanding WHY they feel it. So give the poor kid some relief, for crying out loud!
But I digress. When I got into LAX, I picked up my rental car and headed for the Burbank airport, where my mom's flight would touch down in a few hours. I used the meantime to run a few errands and reveled in the ready availability of my favorite brands of toiletries. When the time came, I had to circle the airport six times before I finally saw my mom's fiery red hair and Cheshire cat grin.
After a curbside reunion of long hugs, we heeded the requests of the airport guard to move along and headed out to the nearby Outback Steakhouse, as few other options presented themselves and we were both ravenous. After catching up over a lunch that reacquainted me with the ridiculous size of American portions, I drove us to our hotel in Marina del Rey.
We spent the evening chatting, laughing, and going through the trip supplies I had set aside before I had left for South America for her to bring to me in LA. (I know. I'm ridiculously anal retentive and over-prepared. Big ol' type A personality.) Mom fell asleep before midnight, but, despite my own exhaustion, I couldn't settle down. I stayed up late into the night rearranging my things, setting aside clothes and supplies from my pack for my mom to take back with her, and picking what I would take from what she had brought me.
The next day, I slept quite late and only roused myself for the lunch I had arranged with my childhood best friend, Rhea, who now lives in LA.
After a lovely meal, during which my mom flirted hysterically with the waiter, the three of us piled into my rental car, and we headed to Hollywood to see the sights. LA's infamous traffic delayed us for nearly an hour, and when we finally reached Hollywood Boulevard, I grumbled unhappily to find that everything looked rather small and unimpressive in real life. Mom, however, couldn't resist getting a picture with one of the many costumed street performers-- I use the term performer loosely here-- since her beloved pseudo-grandchild Cole loves Spiderman so much.
My disappointment in our sight-seeing venture ended abruptly when we arrived for an exquisitely kaleidoscopic sunset at Griffith Observatory. One of the staff astronomers on hand said it ranked as the most beautiful he'd seen in his 23 years working there.
We took in a showing of the excellent and educational "Centered on the Universe" projection program in the planetarium and headed to the observatory deck to view the city by night.
Rhea and I viewed Jupiter through one of the massive telescopes, and then the three of us headed back into the city for a scrumptious meal at diner Fred 62....
... where our waiter sported my favorite message T-shirt of all time.
My mom and I spent the next two days mostly just enjoying each other's company and hanging out. We swam in the hotel pool, got pedicures and a haircut for me, had dinner with a friend from home--the lovely and bitingly funny Erin Drew-- one night and with two of my friends from my company's LA office another. On our last morning, I rented a bike from the hotel and rode up the beach to Santa Monica.
Around noon, I took my mom back to Burbank where we said a tearful goodbye. I then spent the day running errands and buying more sundresses, which I had found to be the most practical articles of clothing for my trip. I returned my car rental and hopped the shuttle to LAX. If only getting on the plane had proven simpler.
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Location:Los Angeles, California, USA
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