Still Breathing

We have been home for just under 5 days now. Dan and I are still feeling a little jet-lagged, but Harper seems to be sleeping very well. We are very lucky that she is taking it easy on us.

I have to say that I can’t wait to feel normal again. I love Harper and she has been such a trooper with all of this upheaval, but I simply can’t wait until this different lifestyle we now have… feels normal. It is so weird to feel like I have to skulk around my own house so I don’t wake The Beast, like she as somehow usurped our power, in an instant, and made it her own. She also comes with a lot of… stuff. Now, I am not against stuff in general, but if it was calculated and made proportional to age or weight, I may understand it a bit better. Boy, has she got baggage.

Our trip home was a test of fortitude. Thursday morning in Guangzhou (Wednesday evening here on the east coast) we left via plane to head to Hong Kong, to then fly 13 and a half hours to LAX. I can’t sit still for that long, I also can’t sleep. When there was only four hours left of our flight I felt like turning cartwheels up and down the aisle. I couldn’t wait to get off the plane. No, really… I… Couldn’t… Wait. Lives were at stake.

We thought we were making a good decision by spending one night in Los Angeles before we flew back to Vermont the next day and it would have been if we were actually able to get on a plane. Due to a power outage at LAX and many cancelled flights previously to our arrival, we ended up in lines far too long to reach the check-in counter before our flight closed its doors. Very discouraging. Not only did we miss our flight that had a stand-by list of 40 to 50 people, we had to somehow get on a different flight. The best that anyone could do was a flight the next day with a lengthy layover at Dulles.

Since there was nothing we could do we went back to our hotel. Since we had checked out earlier, we ended up with a different room, a room with some weak air conditioning and some weird bugs that would occasionally show themselves. We were tired and disappointed that we would not be home that night. Then the water in the hotel was shut off and we were REALLY disappointed that we would not be home that night. After four hours and a few phone calls, we had water… brown, yucky water. It truly was a comedy of errors.

We flew out the next morning and made it safely to Dulles where we were greeted with the departure board listing our flight to Burlington as delayed until 11:19 pm. (We had arrived at 6.) There was a line of thunderstorms in between us and home. Our departure time was listed as the last flight leaving for the night and I have to say that I was scared $&%*less that we would have to overnight in Washington, too. Our flight actually left earlier than listed, but we had no idea that it would until they called us for boarding. The pilot rocketed us home and we finally arrived very early Sunday morning.

So, we are home and our laundry is finally clean, although still not put away. I know that we had left only 23 days ago, but if feels like three years.

Dan, Harper and I greatly appreciate all of your comments, emails, and phone calls. They were one of the few things that kept us going. We are very lucky.

Now, to anyone that I have not responded to yet… I will… I promise. Please bear with us. But it just may take another three years… in this weird, baby-esque space/time continuum.

We love you.
Dan, Janet and Harper

P.S. More pics and video for our die hard fans (Grandmas, et al.)

Homeward Bound