It's been a long time since I've sipped a spot of sad. It happened when I realized it's been nearly 2 years to the date when I went to Morocco. So much has changed in my life since then. Many plans have been put on permanent hold, exciting itineraries canceled. My travel footprint much smaller, forever restricted. *sigh* I won't write about my sadness today because then it might own me for a while and I don't want that. I'm pretty gosh darn good at reinventing myself.

Below is the first entry to my Morocco Journal. I used to dream of returning, but long before I was diagnosed I'd decided not to return... to keep the memories sealed in my grateful heart. It was a good decision with unexpected foresight.

We who like words and like to write have a keener sense of observation than most people. It's a blessing and a bane. A writer can't just write, "It was a long flight to Morocco." The writer tries to capture every nuance. The adrenalin rushes - all 10 senses jump into action - especially the eyes, which become a periscope with a glimpse of the seen and unseen. Words become stones in a tumbler and land on the page as refined as possible as the mind races for alternative descriptive words to describe and re-describe over and over again the world as seen, perceived. Sloppy, unpolished words work too, because they can be endearing with unbridled enthusiasm.

A writer has the unique latitude to write truth as seen. Take Venice, Italy for example. One writer may see the romance and history and hard-to-describe beauty... while another might see only the rats and garbage.

This is how I experienced my flight to Morocco... a country I fell in love with while still in the air.

*****


2/18/2011 Friday 5:15 pm EST JFK

I'm on the last leg of my journey to Casablanca where my driver, Ishmael, will greet me. All my airline connections have gone well and at each terminal an attendant has been available to transport me via wheelchair to my next departure gate. You cannot begin to imagine my gratitude for this service. Without the assist I would have walked many miles and gotten lost many times.

To fly Royal Air Morac I had to go through security again. It was much tighter this time with a passport inspection required four times! The final passage to the jet had additional security and a dog that anxiously sniffed all embarking scents.

Air Maroc is very Francais. My meager French is feeling very foolish at the moment. Other than a few American travelers, all the others are spilling French from fast moving lips at a furious pace. I catch only a simple word here and there. A fellow American claims that English is widely spoken in Rabat and other large cities. Hmm.

We've been in the air for about 4 hours and have 3 more before we land. That will make it midnight my time and 5 a.m. Morocco time - an hour earlier than stated on my ticket. I've overheard other passengers grumbling about this typo. I can't sleep. Gah. I'm usually asleep before lifting from the runway, but my eyes won't relax, my mind won't tuck in for the night.

A woman sits beside me. At first she intimidated me, but slowly I've discovered she's very sweet. She probably had some initial reservations about me, too - being seated next to an American. She is quite old and fragile looking. She's a cross between Mother Teresa and an Islamic Steel Magnolia. She's very tiny, but her leathery brown skin speaks large. She's draped from head to toe in a cream colored habit of sorts. Its design and manner of draping are new to me. It's oddly fashionable, though I'm sure that's not the intent. Peeking from her billowing sleeves are several under garments. One of the cuffs is covered with delicate pink embroidery. I keep thinking how hot she must be. There's also a tattoo on her face. It's a very soft black (maybe softened with age) running from the bottom of her bottom lip to her chin. (I later learned that her attire was indicative of old, very traditional clothing and that the tattoo used be commonly done after a woman married - it marked her as no longer being available.)

Her daughter-in-law checked on her a few times. I witnessed so much love and concern exchanged with their eyes. They spoke a bit, which of course I couldn't understand. I imagined it went something like this, "Do not worry my dear daughter-in-law, devoted wife to my son, the mother of my precious grandchildren... the American is quite harmless despite her uncovered head. She has a nice smile and offered me a mint, which was quite delicious."

Well, maybe something like that.

At one point during the flight I spoke some butchered French with the daughter-in-law. Grasping for words, I used the word *sucre* to describe my seatmate, her mother-in-law. I was trying to convey that she was sweet. This propelled the daughter-in-law into action to find a flight attendant who could provide me with sugar. Oye. My poetic prose didn't translate well with multiple languages involved, but I found it so touching that the daughter-in-law was trying to help me.

A trip to les toilettes provided additional entertainment for my fellow travelers. A sturdy yank on what I thought was the door handle resulted in an unused ashtray dislodging from the door and into my grip. I felt so very foolish standing in the aisle holding the ashtray.

At one point during the flight I retrieved my camera from my backpack. Mind you, this is no easy task when one is shoe-horned into a seat and one also has limited mobility because of bolted hip joints. I asked my elderly seatmate if I could take her photo - by asking, I mean I pointed to the camera while smiling a goofy smile with my eyebrows twisted into a question mark. She smiled back, infinitely more dignified than me, and said, "No," with her hands. Maybe I should've persisted, but I didn't want to offend her or overstep any boundaries. I would so loved to have had her photo to show you. She was simply exquisite and elegant... a rarefied creature I find difficult to describe. *sigh* When we parted, I didn't even know her name.

By the 7th hour into our flight my seatmate and I are looking out for each other. I suspected she was thirsty so I rinsed out her coffee cup and filled it with water from my bottle. She greedily drained it. I also noticed she'd wrapped a few items she hadn't eaten to take with her, so I wrapped my extra muffin and placed it on her tray. She smiled. As I prepared to take a short nap before landing, she took her extra pillow and gently wedged it behind my shoulders.

With no names, no language, and no assignment... it's amazing the generous amount of untapped humanity that lies in wait for the opportunity to take action. My experience with this aged Moroccan women made me realize my volunteering would be successful despite the language barriers because the welcoming heart knows no boundaries.

Just prior to our Casablanca arrival my seatmate pointed to the Royal Air Maroc blanket I'd been using. Her gestures indicated she was worried I might leave it behind - I already noticed her neatly folded blanket in her carry-on. So, to satisfy her, I folded my blanket and slipped it into my backpack. As we approached North Africa I couldn't dismiss the nagging thought that my right hand was already in peril with the purloined blanket and we hadn't even landed on Islamic soil. Yet, I turned to her and spoke the language we shared... and smiled.

Disembarking the jet took all of my Cirque de Soliel skills. As I'd never before seen, our pilot parked our behemoth jet smack dab in the middle of nowhere. A long and steep staircase was rolled up and we all teetered down in the pre-dawn darkness. Then we all teetered onto buses, which transported us to the terminal. Apparently wheelchair service is not available in Morocco so it was with much gratitude that I accepted help from a fellow passenger.

Customs took forever with several look-sees at my passport. The agent was serious and somber. He was such a slowpoke about letting people through. With an air of great importance, he shuffled papers and thumped a stamp repeatedly on people's passports. He hardly ever looked up. On my custom information sheet I put *artist* as my occupation. I usually put retired. I hesitated a bit - not wanting to be eyeballed as a flaky American artiste. As soon as the agent scanned my paperwork, his face lit up. For some reason he was delighted that I was an artist. Throughout the whole dreary process he suddenly transformed. It was most unusual and pleasing for me. What a welcome!

m'a ssalama (goodbye, with peace)