Eight o'clock. Miles looks out the window and sees the taxi waiting at the door. Everything is going exactly as planned: his tie is tight, his papers are in order, his suitcase is locked. He breathes with the satisfaction of a watchmaker.

Eight-fifteen. The taxi moves slowly, too slowly. Eight-twenty. Still on the same avenue. Eight-thirty. The traffic becomes an impossible wall to cross. Eight-forty-five. Finally, the lights of the airport appear, but its tranquility has already been shattered.

The check-in line hits him like a slap in the face: endless, motionless, exasperating. Everything he'd calculated evaporates in the face of the slowness of the real world. The clock seems to speed up while the suitcases in front of him barely move. Every sigh from another passenger rattles his nerves. And then he remembers: he's traveling in first class. He's entitled to priority. His heart leaps, as if he's found a secret exit in the middle of the maze. He runs to the right line and, for a moment, feels like he's regaining his lost control.

But the calm is short-lived. He runs toward security, passport in hand. He trips, the document falls to the floor, and a passenger glares at him. Shame blazes across his face. The scene hits him hard: everything he'd tried to keep under control slips away like sand through his fingers. However, the unexpected happens: the check is swift, almost automatic. The machine doesn't reveal any metallic objects forgotten at the last minute; the guard barely glances at them. In a matter of minutes, boarding is announced.

📖 Losing control, finding the journey

Miles's anxiety is fueled by an illusion: the idea that everything can be foreseen, noted, calculated. But it only takes a taxi stopped in traffic or a passport slipping from his grasp to remind him that control is always fragile. The paradox is that, in those moments when he feels everything is falling apart, the door also opens to real experience: the certainty that travel is not about imposing order, but about traversing disorder.

This is evident in episodes like this: the falling of the passport, the stumble in line, the stern look from a stranger. All these small incidents, as annoying as they are inevitable, also mark the beginning of a learning process: the process of letting go of the reins, even if it's forced.

The plane takes off and he finally lets himself fall into his seat. He discovers that no checklist, no schedule, no calculation can stop the unpredictable flow of a journey. That a red light, a slow line, or a passport on the floor is enough to show him that nothing depends entirely on him. And yet, he also learns that in the midst of chaos, calm can emerge, like that glass of champagne that arrives just when your body can't take it anymore.