The new neighbor saw me in the alley looking at his house, the one pulsating with dance music, illegal fireworks shooting from the roof, and came over and begged me not to call the police.  I would never call the police.  An assassin, on the other hand, would be a permanent solution to the problem.  He tried to blame his kids.  They were just having fun.  No.  It was his loud voice that was always dominating the proceedings.  He’d earned enough money to be as noisy as he wanted to be.  The rest of us just lived here.

The party wouldn’t have bothered me so much if I didn’t have a shuttle to LAX at five in the morning, about the same time they usually were wrapping up their affairs.  The fact that I was sleeping in a cloth camper didn’t help matters much.  It was like I was sleeping in front of one of their speakers, right in the middle of the dance floor. 

Another firework went off like a stick of dynamite, causing car alarms to go off all around the block.  Could I blame them for having some Halloween fun?  No.  Not really.  Could I put on a mask and slip some poison into their punch bowl.  It shouldn’t be that difficult.  I’d just empty one of the rat traps.

By five o’clock, I was lying there rigid with fury, my suitcase on the floor next to me.  Since I was already dressed, all I needed to do was sit up and put my shoes on.  I went out the side gate and waited for the shuttle on the porch.  The pickup time came and went.  When the shuttle was fifteen minutes late, I started to get worried, and after a half hour, agitated.  I looked at my invoice for the ride, and somehow found a phone number for the driver. 

It sounded like he picked up the phone in Lagos.  How long had he been in the country?  He was sitting in the darkness, one block over.  When I corrected him on the street address, he got out and tried to find the house on foot.  We didn’t have time for that.

When he finally pulled up in front of the house, he tried to make up for lost time.  We raced up to Seal Beach Boulevard and went barreling north on the 405.  The traffic was still pretty sparse.  As we got closer to the airport my mood began to lighten. 

Considering two days earlier I hadn’t even known I’d be going to Mexico City for Day of the Dead, I was pretty lucky to have found a reasonable roundtrip flight and hotel for the first five days.  At the speed we were moving now, we’d get there in plenty of time.  What if I hadn’t thought to call the driver, however?  Although I’d still tip him, I wouldn’t be showering him with smiles and praise anytime soon.  If he was going to be responsible for getting people to the airport, he’d better get with the program fast.

United flies out of Terminal 7.  Like many international flights to Mexico and Central America, I would be transitioning through Houston, which I knew to be an enormous airport.  A handful of times I’d come close to missing my flight, so little time had they given me to pass through security and make it to my gate.  That couldn’t happen on this trip.  The Day of the Dead Parade was happening the next day, and it had been a stroke of fortune to get a flight arriving when it did. 

My passport wouldn’t scan when I got to the kiosk to check myself in.  A woman had to come over and help me.  Then it was an additional thirty-five dollars to check a bag.  When I’d dropped off my bag and passed through security, I still had a few minutes, so got a coffee, banana, and muffin.

There was a Mexican woman next to me on the flight who barely spoke any English.  I tried to help her with her eight-hundred-pound bag.  It was a three-hour flight to Houston.  I’d brought along a copy of the Tibetan Book of the Dead which I thought might make a relevant addendum to my three-and-a-half-week trip.  I also was bringing along a set of rune stones and a few books explaining their significance. 

For a slim book, the Book of Dead was full of dense writing.  I had to read the first paragraph at least a dozen times, my mind distracted by the upcoming adventure and still worried about making the airport transfer.

When I got to Houston, I had to walk a half mile to get to my next gate.  My feet had inexplicably blown up with arthritis.  It was painful to walk, but I had no choice, but to move fast regardless.  If I needed to walk on coals to be there on time for the Day of the Parade, I was willing to do so.  There are just some things in life that you need to see.