Cry, Cry Again

I'm 35 years old, and when I missed an airport train to London by 30 seconds at some hideous pre-dawn hour, I burst into tears. I cried the whole 20 minutes waiting for the next train, and then the whole hour home.

I cried because I'd sat for more than six hours on a Ryanair flight by the side of the runway without food or water, except if I wanted to pay for it in exact change in the proper currency given to a couple of lying cabin attendants (volcanic ash delaying us, my ass). I cried because I'd had 2.5 500g bars of dark chocolate for dinner and snacks because I had nothing else to eat, because airport security had taken my other food. I cried because I'd paid £35 for a dinner I really wanted to attend, and because I'd a thousand times rather have eaten 1500 calories worth of amazing food than 1500 calories worth of not-amazing dark chocolate. I cried because I was still hungry and felt slightly sick, especially after two days of cheap, crummy food. I cried because I'd had to wait for two hours at immigration, behind a planeload of kissing Korean couples wearing more designer labels than I've seen since my days covering fashion shows and in front of a chirpier-than-chirpy Midwestern American teacher who kept talking about her church. I cried because I couldn't just take a taxi from the airport, which I might have done a couple of years ago, and because I couldn't just take a taxi from Kings Cross (ditto). I cried because I had no juice in my phone because my international converter had gone missing and I had a spare at home and didn't want to buy an extra for a short trip where I shouldn't have needed one at all. I cried because Sicily looked like almost everywhere else in Italy I've ever been (which is most of it) and I didn't much care about seeing any part of it. I cried because I have unfinished tax returns in two countries and an overflowing inbox of emails from people wanting and waiting for things and a messy flat and blueberries probably rotting in my fridge. I cried because I'd had a bad photo of me doing yoga appear in London's Evening Standard on Wednesday and couldn't bear any more straining-for-something-positive-to-say texts about it. I cried because I couldn't think of who to call that would make me feel better anyway. I cried because I couldn't call my sister – who'd just given birth to triplets via emergency C-section (more on this later, possibly after sleep). I cried because what the f—k was I doing in Sicily when my sister was giving birth to triplets, and for that matter, what am I doing on the other side of the Atlantic in general. I cried because the babies are named for my mother and uncle and grandfather, none of whom are here to see them. I cried because I was tired – both from lack of sleep and from fighting on what feels like every front for the past several weeks. I cried because it was all just a little bit too much.

And I cried because I'm too old to cry about such things.

Then, when I missed the No. 30 bus from Kings Cross – also by about 15 seconds – I kicked the bus stop advertising. Then I kicked it again several times.

It didn't make me feel any better.

During the whole 14-plus-hour ordeal, I thought several times about buying extra food, or bingeing. I kept pulling the options out of my pocket, rolling them around like pebbles through my fingers. "Would food make things better?" I asked myself.

No, it would not, was the answer every time.

That didn't make me feel better, either.