Escalator Selfie Haneda Airport, Japan

    This tunnel is well lit. Some tunnels are rabbit holes, some filled with pack rat vaults. Some tunnels are underground, dark and womb like, leading to gold and silver leprechaun caches. Some tunnels are constructed with giant boring machines, go under seas and through mountains to large impressive cities. Through some tunnels we enter this world, and through others, leave. This horizontal escalator is a metaphor for our times. Pampered, we need to walk, but aren’t forced to. Two girls pass me, in a hurry. One lifts her phone and takes a selfie. This gleaming tunnel moves us all steadily forwards. We go where we are told,are put where we are wanted, are entered on flight lists, and ring up charges on our credit cards in a debt-centric world. I think I’m in a rabbit hole and, like Alice, trying to find real and valuable isn’t always easy. This flat escalator, if I stayed on it, could roll me right off the edge of our Earth. When I come to the escalator’s end, I pick up my little suitcase and get back to walking like i was designed to do.