SFO

I didn't realize an airport would stir so many memories, let alone this one. I usually flew through San Jose, and toward the end Oakland; SFO was for special occasions. But then, maybe that's why I remember them so much.

Here, Sasha and I once nearly followed B.J. to Japan, while Robert, Andrew, Craig Janik and others dashed about the terminal in a comedy of errors and unexpected convergences. Here, I once waited breathlessly as Sasha finally came tumbling through security moments before they closed the door to our flight to Santiago; another time I stumbled out of immigration on my way home from Tokyo just in time to make a CASIO focus group in San Jose. Here, I picked up Karen after her quarter in Chile, Patrick after his six months in a Japanese village. It was a place for belated reunions and awkward partings.

And even before that, flying in, I felt a lurch in my stomach as I glanced out the window and first saw the Bay. Somewhere down there were Stanford, and Fry's Electronics, and CASIO's old offices; a few miles away on Castro Street sat a credit union that momentarily became a venture fund. Further down El Camino Real there was the Target where Sasha and I had our first adventure, buying a bike (sometimes you've got to start small.) And there, somewhere along the water's edge, were the apartments where Patrick, Jeff and I nearly lived, before a high-tension power line popped up behind the bedroom window.

I didn't think about anything in particular as I looked out there, but the tingle persisted. Maybe it was a sense of homecoming. It felt a bit like that when I took my first breath on the jetway and smelled a familiar blend of salt and sunshine in the air. Then again, I've also felt I was coming home arriving in Santiago, Boston, Denver, even Patzcuaro. I'm a jack of all trades with memories as restless as my feet.

Later, in a rented Dodge Magnum, I drove across the bridge to Oakland and instinctively stabbed the radio to switch to Candle on the Water--the song I always played crossing the Golden Gate, the Dumbarton, the Bay Bridge, the San Mateo, any and all of them--before remembering that my Disney Classics CD is somewhere in a closet, and that I'm not even sure what state the closet is in.

So I sang the song instead, as best I could, windows down, hair all a mess.

And the tingle persisted--at least until I hit traffic.