Thursday, June 1
Icelandair DTW > KEF
Carla Harryman
The lonely imperative of travel, as if one is uniquely hailed. That is ideological, covered in pin feathers (illustration by Icelandic expatriate artist Eero above). It was an idea of mine to go north, to seek out the (scratch that). Over the long duration of our disease, the two survivors had lived on only home cooking and streaming Nordic crime series on Netflix. In the event, something was missing or being covered up—that is what is meant by “the body,” which kept us glued to our seats. The disused warehouse of narrative effects is where all bodies are kept, we would find, each waiting to be worked into the upcoming narrative. Not really—for years there had been a blank place in the narrative, now determined to be “magnetic north.” At some point in early winter it was decided, she suggested. Putting in place a plan, all would unfold but not necessarily the way it was predicted. I believe there is no drama here, only the outer shell of a fate that would be enacted, to be revealed. The crime genre is never really surprising, as we are gripped in our seats. The seats were booked on a newly refinanced Icelandair Boeing 737 Max, now returned to service, on a stopover in Iceland. The real thrill was seeming to go nowhere and ending up in a place we had imagined. Blank fields of lava unfold under the belly of the plane with special webcams for passengers. It will be early morning the next day when we arrive at our destination.
