I used to pass time at the airport. This was before heightened security when you could go unticketed, luggageless and sit in the airport bar or by the big windows and watch the planes come and go, watch the travelers come and go. I would order a beer or a coffee, read a book or sketch the planes. Once in a while I brought someone with me. I would say, it's a port, an airport. How natural to pass time watching a port. I was plagued by wanderlust and the vague desire to fly an airplane. I was full of questionable romanticism. Once, I told my sister I had brought a date there. She told me something I had never heard before. She told me that our mother also used to pass time at the airport. I had no idea. Our mother had never flown anywhere. As far as I knew she preferred trains. Yes, my sister said, it's true. When I asked my mother about it she said that she and my father had had their first date at the airport, ordering drinks at the bar. I think she told me that they listened to a piano player there but I may be misremembering that part.
Emily Farranto is an artist who lives in New Orleans.