When I was eight years old, I was bricked into a room with an older woman named Jutta. This wasn’t some medieval torture, but a common religious practice. Women would volunteer to be irrevocably isolated from the world to bring them closer to God. As you might guess from my age, sometimes their families volunteered them. I was terrified and Jutta’s practice was querulous, as if she could bargain sainthood for her imprisoned life on earth. I would never have chosen what my mother chose for me. Yet, despite the imprisonment and Jutta’s cantankerous longing, God did see me. He blessed me with visions and music and poetry, some of which you can hear on YouTube now, a millennia later and an ocean away.
What should you do at the airport? The same thing you should do anywhere. Read, create, learn. Find things that fire your curiosity and challenge your knowledge. Find joy in every second that is given to you, because it is a finite number no matter how large. Make good use of each one.
Hildegard von Bingen