Waiting at the Customs chute

I went to the airport yesterday to meet Jenifer getting off her flight. With a minor delay and flights from New York, Kiev and Amman, Jordan funneling through Customs all at once, the waiting crowd and I ended up standing in the meeting area for about an hour and a half. It was actually quite a blast. Nervous excitement locked the room with many choked-up and pacing, cameras hanging around their necks. The doors which arriving passengers emerge from slide open from a mirrored wall, and then they walk down a runway created by railings, past all of the waiting people, one or a group of whom would be gasping and waving for the person. It's dramatic. Every couple minutes the doors slide apart and out pokes... a cart of suitcases. Pushed by... _______! 

The hero does a victory march down the runway as if the whole crowd was clapping for them. Some couldn't wait to get that far, hugging and crying over the railing. Once, a mother and her young son and daughter came through the stage-curtain doors and the kids spotted their father standing next to me and made a bee-line through the railing, in fast-forward, plowing into him kissing and hugging and crying. It was a bigger emotional ride than many movies.

Coming together, after who-knows-how-long, reminds people how dangerous the wide world can feel and to be safe at home just means having your family together again.