ASNE Institute June 5 (part I)

Sunday

Flights are full today, especially flights to Oakland from Salt Lake. I sit in the corner of terminal C and wait for the hour or so to pass before takeoff. I avoid the sun because the terminal is already stuffy with people. I begin reading The Life of Pi, the book I checked out from the library at the suggestion of Mary Ward, a fellow English teacher. After a few pages, I'm hooked: "A book to make you believe in God."

Boarded the flight, sat down in aisle seat 19D for the short 2 hour flight to Oakland. I'm tired. I don't really want to make conversation with the folks on my right. I'm mostly lazy, but am also feeling the last two late nights. The couple seems immersed in their own conversation anyway. As the flight ascends over the Great Salt Lake, they comment and I offer some Salt Lake tidbits. They introduce themselves, a young couple from Flagstaff, doing a three-month nursing stint in California. They are kind and interested in my travels. We make conversation as I chide myself for wanting to wrap up in my cocoon. The conversation tapers off and I doze.

Getting to know a new city is like meeting a new neighbor. Slight apprehension seems to accompany the initial meeting, but the result is almost always pleasant. With unlimited finances, I could stand to meet more neighbors. I think of the sacrifices we make to teach, but being in my professional "calling" has felt right.

I wait at the airport for the AirBART transit. BART is the Bay Area Rapid Transit system that links Frisco, Oakland, Berkeley, and a host of other smaller locales. AirBART is a bus that picks you up at the airport and drops you off at the trains. AirBART is full and my bags end up at the bottom of a stack on the shelf in the bus. Nothing breakable in there anyway. I wish I had the camera. We seem to have misplaced it and that frustrates me. If we lose it for good, we'll have to cough up another $200 for a new one.

I buy a BART ticket and wait for the train going to Richmond that will take me by the downtown Berkeley station, where I will take a cab to the Durant Hotel. It's a half hour before check in (3:00) but they let me in anyway.

The room isn't too impressive. Similar size to the Hotel Monaco, where Dawn and I stayed once, but there are no doors over closets and the bathroom has a severely impaired folding closet-type door. The walls are surprisingly thin. I can hear the ice machine bang and crash every 15 minutes or so, and I can hear toilets flush and people making noise in the hall. On the other hand, the bed proves to be very comfortable and the fan over the bed keeps me at my preferred cool temperature.