KAITAIA
Dry air circled around me as I dangled my arm outside the dusty window of my dad’s car. Yellowed fields stretched out in front of us and the sun hung low in the sky. I tried to focus on the weathered signposts that stood completely alone against the grassy bank. I was finally leaving Kaitaia, a rough little town situated at the very top of New Zealand. I would miss the constant warmth that seemed to saturate everything here, but I knew that the cold, dark flat I was returning to would eventually replace these memories. I would begin to question whether Kaitaia was ever really as hot as I had imagined it to be. My mind drifted.
. . .
DUNEDIN
Tears filled my eyes as I watched clumps of people say goodbye to each other. It was a surprisingly warm day, I thought. I didn’t usually let people see me cry, but the thought of leaving made me forget. Summer was not going to be fun for me, it was never fun for me. I wouldn’t even consider going back there if my parents didn’t make me feel guilty about it. It was, in a way, sacrificial of me. I had tried to stop caring about what happened. It was only three months. By the time we all returned to Dunedin from our own unique adventures, we could have all changed significantly. I didn’t want to think about it. My friends hugged me as I tried to quell the soaring anguish that was stirring up inside me.
“Why are you getting so upset?” my friend Robert asked me as I turned to face him with bloodshot eyes. I wiped away the rebellious tears that lingered on my face.
“I don’t expect you to understand” I replied coldly. Maybe I was being overdramatic about all this, maybe it wasn’t going to be as bad as I’d made it out to be.
“It’s only three months” I heard him say. He obviously didn’t know what it was like. Three months spent in isolation and smouldering heat, no-one to talk to but a bunch of animals. He would laugh if I told him, so I decided not to.
. . .
KAITAIA
I didn’t notice as we lurched over the airport speed bumps and pulled in beside the tiny building.
“The plane isn’t even here yet” I sneered, it didn’t actually surprise me.
The people of Kaitaia live by a different perception of time. I wasn’t in any position to try and change it, but I had personally tried and failed to adopt this way of behaving. My dad helped me carry my bags inside and I retrieved my boarding pass from a very tan blonde woman who stood behind a counter.
“You’re headed back to Uni, eh!” the woman laughed as she wrestled my luggage onto the raised platform beside her, I gave her a tight smile before moving towards where my dad was waiting for me,
“You’ll come back and see me in a few months, right?” he asked hopefully.
I replied with a quiet “yes.”
He hugged me before he headed back to the car. I trudged outside after watching him drive away and I slumped on a wooden bench that overlooked the fields and rolling hills. The plane still hadn’t arrived, and I didn’t know how long it would keep me waiting.
. . .
FLIGHT TO KAITAIA
The air conditioner was screaming at me. I wanted to tell it how rude it was being, but realised this would be pointless and a bit strange. Thick clouds were lingering all around the airplane windows, being a nuisance and getting in the way like unshorn sheep on a busy country road. I squinted at the harsh lights that blared down on me, they were making my head hurt. I could feel the recycled oxygen clogging up my nose and throat, and sucking all the moisture out of my skin. I was sick of travelling. I felt like I was being continuously handed back and forth from my two respective homes, like a child whose parents had been divorced. They would tell you it wasn’t your fault, but you still wouldn’t be allowed to stay with one of them forever. That wouldn’t be fair. I slouched in the sticky blue seat and tried to focus on the clouds. They were being sliced through by the bladed wings, dismembered and left behind. Discarded like used tissues.
The people that sat around me were nothing like me. I watched a man who was balding considerably shift uneasily in his seat, the plane was too small and he clearly didn’t enjoy being confined to such a tight space. I was sure that I could see sweat glistening on the bald patch on his head. I wondered why he was flying to Kaitaia. In a different circumstance I may have had the courage to ask him. I would have liked to ask every single person on that plane why they were going there. When I first moved away to study at University, I felt an instant bond with the people that I flew back to Kaitaia with during my first few trips back. John Steinbeck once said that “one of our most treasured feelings concerns roots, growing up rooted in some soil or some community.” For me, Kaitaia was the place I had felt rooted in, it was my community, my hometown. The people in this plane were inevitably connected to me by the place I had grown up in, the place that I had called my home for so much of my life. Now I looked at these people with contempt. I contemplated their motivations for going to Kaitaia. It must have been mildly important, after all they were enduring an hour long flight in a rundown, off-white Beech 1900, the doors of which could have fallen off at any moment and I wouldn’t have been the least bit surprised. I guessed I would never know why these people were going to Kaitaia, the only thing I was sure of was the reasons I was back here. It was mostly guilt, administered to me by my lovely parents, and just a hint of longing to return to the place where life used to be a lot simpler.
. . .
KAITAIA
“If you hate it here so much then why do you even bother coming back?” My dad was yelling and his voice was strained with frustration.
I looked at him carefully. He had deep furrows on his forehead, from a lifetime of worrying. I didn’t know what I was supposed to say.
“No, really” he continued in a loud voice, “I don’t want you to come back if you’re going to be like this.”
They were both staring at me, my mother and him. They were tired of my negative attitude and endless whinging, something was going to have to change. I pulled myself out of the wicker chair I was sitting in and skulked off to my bedroom. It was overflowing with cardboard boxes that spilled their contents out onto the carpet. I snatched up the crinkled clothes littering the bed and threw them on the boxes in a heap. Packing up all my things had proven to be a long and tiring process, but my mother had insisted that I get it done before I left. I sprawled out across the bed and stared at the glossy wooden ceiling. I could still hear my dad complaining to my mother about me.
. . .
FLIGHT TO KAITAIA
During the slow decent back to land, I struggled against my feelings of hopelessness. I could see now that the ground below me was growing larger with every second that passed. The fields spread out further than the cramped aircraft window allowed me to see, there was nothing but fields. Eventually I began to see tiny farmhouses nestled beside specially planted walls of trees, this brought some comfort to me. The patchwork paddocks were dotted with livestock: cattle, sheep and sometimes even horses. There was life in this town, I thought sarcastically, it was just mainly made up of the bovine variety. Kaitaia was ridiculous, it was the definition of a dead-end town. I had read earlier that year that it was ‘economically stagnant’,
“I hope you weren’t planning on getting a summer job!” my friend Alex had laughed hysterically, I narrowed my eyes at him which only made him laugh harder. “Economically stagnant!” he’d cried, “That’s hilarious!”
I hadn’t thought it was. I slid further down in my seat and cast my eyes on the balding man a few rows in front. He was actually more interesting to watch, I had seen enough of the endless countryside to last me at least another year.
. . .
DUNEDIN
I ambled through the emptying aisles of the plane, gripping my black laptop bag to my chest and trying not to make eye contact with those around me. The smartly dressed cabin crew beamed at me as I edged past them, dark rings were forming underneath their eyes but they still seemed quite chipper. I was pretty certain it was part of their job description to always look so happy, it seemed fake to me.
“Thank you” I told them,
“Thank you!!!!” they exclaimed, I cringed from their cheerfulness and made my way out of the plane. It was an unusual exchange, to thank and to be thanked in return. It made it feel like it wasn’t genuine. Once I was out onto the smooth grey tiles of the airport, the desperation I had felt for the last three months began to fall away. Pico Iyer once wrote that the airport is the “spiritual centre of the double life: you get on as one person and get off as another.” When I returned to this airport, a part of me was subsequently returned. The part that was blissful and uncontrolled, that knew the meaning of breaking free from oppression. As I hurried down the sluggish escalator and found my brother waiting by the main entrance, I thought about what it meant to have my happiness determined by whether I was in Kaitaia or Dunedin. I hugged my brother and only then realised how drenched he was.
“So I guess it’s raining then?” I grinned, brushing water drops off his jacket, “It hasn’t rained in Kaitaia for over four weeks”
“Oh, that’s no good” he uttered, “Hopefully it will one of these days”
“There doesn’t seem to be any shortage of it down here” I smiled, I could hear the rain before I could see it as we made our way out through the airport doors. Cold air rushed at me as soon as we were outside. I took a deep breath and let light mist tumble out of my mouth.
. . .
KAITAIA
This wasn’t helping. I realised that I was never going to get through the summer with this attitude. It was like acid, eating away at me, sending me into a dark place that manipulated my thinking. Convincing me that it wasn’t going to get any better. I had to fight against this, I decided. I told myself that going back to Kaitaia was going to be a good thing, it was going to be incredible. A huge part of me didn’t believe this, but I had to be hopeful. I sat up in the sticky blue seat as the airplane lurched and collided with the ground, causing everything to jolt and rumble.
“It’s going to be ok” I said aloud, the roaring of the wheels on tarmac drowned out my words.
“I’m going to make the most of this.” I spoke it into being. I began to think about the father I had not seen in eight months, and my spirit lifted. A forgotten love for this hick-town returned to me. I peered out the window and saw the tiny airport slowly come into view. It looked like a regular office building, a very quaint one. The white paint was dull and faded, and nothing but countryside unfolded behind it. I smiled at the thought of getting off the plane and being greeted by my family. They had told me the night before how excited they were for my return, I owed it to them to at least try to enjoy my time here. The plane careened to a slow stop just in front of the wooden fence that surrounded the airport, tiny faces were lined up all along it. I searched for my dad but couldn’t find him, remembering that my eyesight wasn’t so great and finding him at this distance was unlikely.
. . .
DUNEDIN
This is what it was meant to feel like. My brother guided the car through the slick, wet streets that reflected bursts of colourful lights that lined the sidewalk. I could barely see the road markings that divided the lanes up and showed where to stop for traffic lights, but even this wasn’t going to cause me to panic. Rain drummed on the windscreen and formed huge shallow pools that stretched out across the road. When we drove through them, the car slid uneasily before the tyres were able to regain traction. I strained to make out the buildings that crept past us, it was hard to see anything through all the rain, but I was determined to make sure everything was the same as I had left it. I could make out the figure of the old Leviathan hotel that towered above the intersecting streets, and soon I could see brightly decorated stores that stood in the same place they always had. It looked treacherous outside, but the warmth of familiarity filled me up as we journeyed back to my flat.
. . .
KAITAIA
I watched the balding man struggle to get out of his seat and lumber through the narrow aisle. I pressed my hands up against the window and tried to find my dad in the scattering line of people. I still couldn’t see him. I dragged my laptop back from under the seat in front of me and slung the strap over my shoulder. The plane was almost completely empty, I followed the remaining passengers out through the door and down rickety stairs onto the tarmac. I stumbled through the partition in the fence, scanning the faces of the crowd for my dad. The people in front of me embraced those that waited for them, I began to feel nervous and awkward, I convinced myself that everyone must have known no-one was here to get me. The luggage trailer slowly rolled up to the gate and people collected their bags from it. I trudged over to it and hauled my suitcase off the side, pulling it to a wooden bench just outside the airport doors. The sun was hot and blazed down on me, I dropped onto the wooden bench and fought to keep my composure. Anxiety was filling my body, and every hope I had was beginning to evaporate. I searched and searched for my dad in the dwindling number of people, but he was nowhere. There was nobody here that I recognised.
I sat silently and watched the people around me. I absently noted that the luggage trailer was being rolled around to the other side of the airport now, by a big burly man in a fluorescent orange vest. I felt completely alone and abandoned. Forgotten. My heart hammered against my chest, propelling tears that began spilling from my eyes. Only minutes had passed since I departed the plane, but all the optimism I had tried so hard to summon was now completely gone. I sat there and cried. I cried for the hopefulness I had been robbed of, for the way I had assured myself things might be different. Mostly I cried because I missed Dunedin. I felt homesick.
. . .
DUNEDIN
There was always glass everywhere. It lay scattered on the sidewalk and caught the sunlight like thousands of tiny jewels, casting off shimmering gleams of green and silver. The air was sharp, it clung to my face and hands and made me pull my coat tighter around me. I didn’t mind the cold, it was refreshing. It helped to wake me up, and when I breathed I could see it. I crunched the glass beneath my feet, the sound of it made me smile. I was walking back to my flat, the sun was shining but it wasn’t warm. It wasn’t like Kaitaia. I looked up at the wiry trees, which had branches that crisscrossed around each other into a big tangled mess. The sky was a very clear blue, it was an honest blue. I surveyed the sky for any approaching rainclouds, I always welcomed them and felt grateful for the deluge of water that was unleashed on the city. It was the only way that the vomit on the street was ever going to get washed away, I thought with a grin.
. . .
KAITAIA
Women I hadn’t noticed before began approaching me, putting their hands on my shoulders.
“Is someone here to pick you up, dear?” A voice asked kindly as I cried bitterly,
“My dad was meant to be here” I sobbed.
“Where do you live?” another woman asked, I discovered through my glazed vision that there were a number of figures hovering around me, I told them all in a loud voice where my parents’ house was. As soon as I had done so, I was bombarded with offers to take me there.
“I live out that way” I heard someone say, “I can drive you, it’s going to be alright, hun.”
I heard the sound of wheels on gravel and turned to see my dad’s dusty Toyota pulling up beside the airport building.
I took a deep breath and wiped my face with the back of my hand. Peering up at the women who encircled me, I noted that they all seemed very concerned for me, with frowns pasted on each of their faces. I told them that my dad had arrived, which seemed to satisfy them and prompted them to continue with what they were doing before they found me.
“Thank you” I sniffed.
My dad strolled over to me as fresh tears were escaping my squinted eyes, I glared at him and he stared back at me with a vacant expression,
“Why are you crying? I’m only twenty minutes late!”
He pulled me to my feet and put his arms around me before he carried my bags to the car. I slouched in the backseat and stared blankly at the weathered fence-posts that rushed by. Tears continued to fall, they seemed like an endless rain. I wondered if it still rained much in Kaitaia. I thought about asking my dad, but then decided not to.