The Heathrow Airport Experience

Recently a friend told me the place was built atop the lesser known sacred site of a stone circle. Although the spirit I encountered came from elsewhere, chances are the site is still an open portal. It was around the beginning of July, 1980, a late afternoon. I had flown in from Strasbourg, hoping to catch the next flight to Keflavik, standby. If I didn't get on that flight I would have had to wait another two weeks. I was getting seriously jerked around at my work place, interfering with my performance, which required utmost concentration and accuracy in the heraldic handwork of ceremonial scrolls, and protocols of VIP visits. I had barely recovered from a burnout in April, so it was high time for a little self indulging TLC. I had to get as far away from these nuisances as I could, so Iceland couldn't have been more ideal.

The fools actually thought I was putting them on. It never occurred to them that this wasn't the first time I traveled solo on a seeming whim. No, there was always a method to my madness and when they finally came to grips with the reality of it, they were the ones who couldn't handle it. “Why would anyone want to go to Iceland” they said, looking at me like I didn't know what I was talking about. Hanging around with a bunch of sheep-herded tourists in Ibiza or the Cotes d'Azure just isn't my style. I'm a real traveler with my own built-in radar and GPS and what I can't communicate in all the official EU languages, I do with hands and feet. I wanted to go to Iceland to see the world the way the ancient sagas saw it. That's just the way I am.

I was waiting there in the main hall. As transatlantic flights were on a different schedule than commuter, the hall was perfectly empty in that interim between schedules. I was pacing about the place, contemplating my alternatives, should I not get a seat on that flight. There was no way I was going back. I was looking at a poster when I felt a set of heavy foot falls approach from behind, then a warm hand touched my shoulder as a manly voice spoke reassuringly; “don't worry, you will get there”. I turned to respond, but no one was there.

Needless to say, I got there and everything was as I had ventured to imagine. It was like going to another planet entirely. The world as the Norse understood it between the realms of fire and ice. Now when I read the old sagas I know what they are talking about. This is what travel was meant to be, to explore the ancestors and wights of the land. As for my unexpected confidante in Heathrow, I'm sure my heathen colleagues know very well who that was.