Airports are where the most civilized of society hang out. The rich and the poor, side by side, the regulations ensuring everyone is exquisitely behaved.
There are no beggars nor belligerent rugger-types. They must keep their foibles folded away, in their suitcase in the hold.
They can mill a few pints and glug glasses of wine, but the temptation to cross that line must be avoided. Or you might not get on that plane, or even worse, get arrested.
No-one urinates over the toilet floor and swans out laughing in front of his buckled-up mates. There is no shoplifting at the sparkling shops; those Aussie TV shows with the big security man and blue gloves put pay to that.
Children that ran buguluga on the campsite now have dad’s calm gaze monitoring them. The holiday has been good so far, so let’s not ruin it by acting up in the airport.
The un-ruffled pilots and their class-looking cabin staff waft past the great and the not-so-great, never seeing them. Weight is all they see.
They are the masters of the machines that lift all those people through the clouds, juddering on up, smashing on through, with voices softly telling us the altitude, the velocity, the necessity for a brolly when we land.
And everyone wearing AirPods.
It’s the world’s nicest-smelling open prison, with mirrored floors and staff with guns. Gleaming toilets and decent burgers; bars and wine bars; children’s play areas and chapels. And endless, endless people. All arriving or departing, all at their own pace, like water flowing.
All God’s children have a place in the choir, my dad used to say. The airport is where the song is sung.
Myself and Fionnuala were on a weekend break to Trieste. Where Joyce wrote Ulysses. A first break really since the kids were born and she was looking out the window at the runways, a shine in her eyes and a glass of Prosecco in her mitt. I eyed my Guinness.
“That’s a great pint of stout.” I was looking at the people, she at the planes. “I know we are in Dublin, but still.”
A surge of bliss tinkled over me. I saw my pretty wife sitting opposite and, not for the first time, marvelled at her cool persona. She didn’t need to prove anything to anyone. She would be the best man in the room in many a crisis and always made the right move. Like a pilot.
Watching the ungainly planes move about the asphalt, fitting in to the puzzle of stands around the terminal, I smiled at how comfortable we were in this bar, while all these calm and dutiful workers ensured our safe journeys.
How, when we boarded the Boeing, the captain and his flight crew rendered it unnecessary for any of his passengers to have studied aerospace engineering, or mathematics, or physics; they could have studied anything or nothing, it didn’t matter.
“That’s us, nigh.” I was lifting my case and Fionnuala followed, throwing her small rucksack over her shoulder.
“Why have you no carry-on?” I asked, as we floated like beauties in an ad along the travelator.
“I have,” she said. “That’s all your allowed. Unless you pay.”
“No, you get 10kg with your flight.” I had sent her the details to check, then I booked.
“Did you not know that?”
Her eyebrows lifted. “Fabien, you get a small carry-on, and a handbag. And that’s it. A 10kg costs €20 to book online. If you haven’t done that, you have to pay more at boarding.”
Half an hour later, I closed my eyes as we hurtled into the air, up and away from Ireland. I was as fierce and the spitting engines, red with rage, the €60 I had to pay, shame-faced and furious, spoiling every moment that had gone before.