Why Do I Feel So F*%&!ing Good?

It turned out, for the strangest reason of all: no reason

It was a Wednesday, I was on an airplane which is not a place I generally like to be. Window seat, exit row, a man sitting next to me with his elbows over his side of the armrest. Double-masked. I had a notebook open with a page filled with some scribbles, lines of items to attend to upon my return; but most of my attention wandered out the window, looking down on an endless stretch of bleached flat terrain, the uninhabited sprawl of Utah.

I was aware of this subtle sensation — an inner bird trill, or the lapping of waves against a dock— a happy note of . . . something.

I lifted my head. Looked around. The man beside me was watching a movie on his giant phone he propped up on his tray table. Except for the engine, the plane was quiet, as planes have been during pandemic travel (not much talking with strangers buzz). My notebook sat in my lap, the page half filled. More endless wrinkles of Utah stretched out 30,000 feet below.

Daydreaming, writing, looking at the movie on my neighbor’s phone, some landscape photos, repeat. The tap-tap of something strange-ish: a clear, relaxed, smooth-lake feeling.

It was simple. I was in a good mood!