Finneran: Love at Terminal E

Friday, April 12, 2019

Tom Finneran, GoLocalWorcester MINDSETTER™

Tom Finneran

Welcome to Logan Airport.

It’s a busy place with many thousands of people coming and going every day.

Traffic can be tough and the troopers can be tougher. They have an impossible job, pleasantly (or occasionally not) trying to move cars and people along in order to enhance public safety.

Some travelers have serious mobility issues and other travelers have young kids in tow. Either one of these circumstances adds to the general sense of chaos. Given the over-riding atmosphere of hustle and bustle, most terminals don’t play host to the full range of emotions at work when loved ones pass through the doors. It’s more like double or triple parking, a quick herding of luggage from the trunk, and an even quicker hug and kiss goodbye, followed by a “call me when you arrive” shout as the driver jumps back into the car to make his escape.

Except at Terminal E.

Terminal E is the International terminal at Logan. All the other terminals host domestic flights---think New York, Florida, and California. Think Dallas, Chicago, and Washington D.C.

For Terminal E however, think Paris, Tel Aviv, or Bonn. Think Beijing, New Delhi, or Taipei.

There at Terminal E one can watch the full range of human emotions on display. It’s there on the sidewalk outside the terminal that the great blessing of America takes center stage—the blessing of peace, the blessing of tranquility. For right there, on the sidewalk, fear and longing, heartache and worry dominate the dance of departure. There is great confidence in a friend or relative’s departure for Denver, for Denver is in America. There is considerably less confidence in a friend’s departure for Dubai.

I know about this Terminal E phenomenon. I have experienced it first hand. I have watched young lovers hug and touch and tremble. I have watched families hug and cry. I have cried myself. I have prayed. I have trembled. And I have lingered…………and lingered and lingered, long past the point of reason.

There is fear in the air at Terminal E. It’s a fear born out of the lunacy of the world beyond America’s shores. The prolonged lingering, the tears, the hand holding, and the hugs, the longing looks into a son or daughter’s eyes are the telltale signs of fear. As are the hurried looks away as one’s eyes fill with tears.

Nobody seems to take anything for granted at Terminal E. There’s a sense that the outside world is wild and unpredictable. There’s a sense that inexplicable violence can erupt without warning. And there’s an unspoken sense that nothing can be taken for granted beyond America’s shores.

Thus the lingering. Thus the fears. Thus the tears.

Thus love blooms visibly at Terminal E.

Tom Finneran is the former Speaker of the Massachusetts House of Representatives, served as the head the Massachusetts Biotechnology Council, and was a longstanding radio voice in Boston radio