From a few thousand feet in the air I saw an arc of lightning skitter across the dark sky and curl back around on itself like a white hot heavenly tendril. Looking out the airplane window I couldn’t help but exclaim aloud. “Wow!” I said, and felt a little embarrassed at my involuntary shout. A kind older couple sat scrunched next to me in the economy seats on the way from Denver to Houston. I wear earplugs on airplanes, so I wasn’t entirely sure how loudly I had spoken, and as the lightning storm continued I found myself startled again and again and saying “wow!” aloud each time.  

 

Soon after we landed in Houston, the tarmac itself was struck by lightning. The captain crackled over the PA saying that, due to the lightning strike, we wouldn’t be allowed to taxi to our gate for another 20 minutes. The turbines hummed to a stop, and we stayed put for a long while. I was checking my phone nervously, because if I didn’t get off this plane pretty soon, I’d miss my connecting flight home to Jackson, Mississippi. I could see that it was being delayed, and by the time we finally arrived at the gate close to 11pm, it had been cancelled. I knew I’d be staying in Houston for the night.  

 

So many people were stranded. I saw a mother walking the terminal with a nearly-newborn, and a man in his eighties meandering alone through the few shops that were still open. A bundle of high school boys were trying to find hamburgers, and I found a seat near a closed Wendy’s where I could charge my phone. I managed to book a hotel, but for the life of me I couldn’t get a ride. There were so many people trying to escape the midnight airport, that all the Uber and Lyft drivers were booked. Finally, after almost an hour of trying I caught one, and checked into my hotel a little before 2am.  

 

Carlos, had picked me up at the airport. I was in such a pinch to book the hotel that I hadn’t realized it was 20 miles away from the airport. But anything closer was crazy expensive. Carlos gave me his card so I could call him the next morning for my return ride to the airport.

 

The next day I talked with Carlos on the way back, while hoping I’d be home by the end of the day.

 

“Did you grow up here in Houston, Carlos?”

 

“No, I’m from Venezuela. I’ve only lived here a little over three years. Before that, we lived in Miami for a few years.”  

 

“Oh, really? Do you have some family back in Venezuela?”

 

“Yeah, my oldest son still lives there with my two brothers.”

 

“And you have a family here?”

 

“Yes, my wife and two younger kids are here with me. I have an 11 year old son and a 7 year old daughter.”  

 

“That’s cool. Do you think you’ll stay here in Houston? Do you like it here?”

 

Carlos went on to tell me a little about the differences between Miami and Houston. He misses some things about Miami. The language. The food. But he likes Houston too. They seem to have a good school situation with his kids and they get to play sports, which they enjoy. His face and voice are so bright when he talks about his children. I can tell that he not only loves them very much, but enjoys them. Carlos laughs as he tells me a story about how tough his daughter is on the softball field. She picks on her older brother because he strikes out more than she does. Carlos mimics her sassy facial expressions and mocking voice as he tells stories about her. I can tell Carlos is a great dad, keenly attentive to his children.

 

Once, when I was in college, I took a short trip to Venezuela, but this was just before the country began to get more dangerous politically. I’m wondering why Carlos left.

 

“Carlos, can I ask you something? Did you and your family leave Venezuela or did you have to, you know, escape for some reason?”

 

“Yes, we actually had to escape, after I was kidnapped.”

 

“You were kidnapped?” I was a little startled.

 

“I was. Back in Venezuela, I owned a small business. I didn’t have a  lot of money, but somebody had been watching my transactions. They knew when I made money, and they knew how much. One day, these guys kidnapped me, and demanded that I give them all the money in my business. I had to do it.”

 

He tells me this in such a matter-of-fact manner. I guess it has been a good many years since the incident, but still, I can’t imagine how terrified he must have been.

 

“Once they got their ransom they released me, but they told me that they knew where I lived, where my wife worked, where my kids went to school, and that there would be a next time, basically. When they came back I better be ready to give them more money.”

 

I couldn’t believe it. A few minutes ago, I was just riding in a taxi with a normal guy. Now, I’m riding in a taxi with a normal guy who has been kidnapped, threatened, and managed to flee a country with his family.

 

“So what did you do?”

 

“Well, we decided that, even though we had an apartment and a business, we had to find some way to get out of the country. Venezuela is such a dangerous place to live now. Very dangerous. Very hard to make a living. We made it to the US.”

 

“That’s crazy, Carlos. I’m glad you made it.”

 

“Yes, we had to leave everything, but my family is doing good.”

 

I asked him how long he’d been driving a taxi, and he said about three years. It’s good work for him because he can set his schedule around his family’s schedule.

 

“I can work any job, and I can work really hard. I don’t really care what I do, as long as I can be with my family. Nothing matters but getting to be with my wife and kids. I don’t want them to have to work as hard as me when they grow up. But I don’t want them to grow up without me. I’m trying to take care of them, and be a dad who is always there for them. So I work until they are home from school. I go to their ballgames. And I put them to bed at night. As soon as they are asleep, I go back to work.”

 

Carlos dropped me off, and I watched flight after flight get cancelled again that day. I did manage to book a hotel closer to the airport, with a free shuttle. I don’t have the space here to detail the conversation I had with a young Sudanese man who drove that shuttle. He was kind. He is making a home in the United States, and he told me that even though Sudan is a broken place and a hard place with many hurting feelings, it will always be his country, he will always love it. He will always carry hope that things will get better.

 

I spent the better part of the week stuck in Houston. I was tired and anxious to get home. Maybe airports have a way of concentrating our awareness of the people around us? They are perfect places for people-watching. So many colors, shapes, sizes, faces, and voices inhabiting one place. Hundreds and hundreds of walking histories. Each person a story interlaced with endless other stories. Who can trace them all?  

 

Who knows what poverty or riches have come upon the people we pass in the terminal to carry them to or from their homes. Who is flying from whom or to whom? I met a man from Ethiopia returning from visiting his mother for the first time in years. I stood in line with a girl from Mexico City with crooked teeth and incandescent blue eyes. A little old Bulgarian lady who pulled scraps of paper printed with phrases in English, wordlessly pulled me with her to the customer service desk. Not all the faces and voices I saw while stuck in the airport were gentle. Some were angry, as you’d expect. But most were kind.

 

I heard someone say once that there is a Person bigger than the Universe, and that if he pleases he may ride a single droplet of dew from leaf-tip to the ground in some corner of the wild world where no human has ever set foot. He may unfurl a shocking tendril like a bright bullwhip across the high heavens, even as he bends his ear tenderly in the silence that follows the thunder to inhabit with us our most hidden stories.