Twenty-one months ago we got on a plane at LAX and headed for Abu Dhabi in the UAE. From that time till today we had not set foot in the U.S. Longest such stretch in my life. Leah’s, too.

We might have come back for a visit sooner, but flying from the UAE, on the northeastern tip of the Arabian Peninsula, to Los Angeles is not a decision made lightly. You can get here from there, but not anytime soon.

But when we woke up today, and the sun was shining and a breeze was blowing on a 70-degree day, and I threw open the doors and let the light shine in and reveled in “sunny and cool” … well, then the monster trip was worth it.

How long a trip?

From door to door, more than 8,500 miles and just under 30 hours. Yes, 30. And I didn’t stop to visit someone or see a baseball game.

Out of the Abu Dhabi apartment at 8 a.m., at the airport at 8:45, on the plane (a packed-out Etihad flight) at 10:30, then the l-o-o-o-g nonstop to Chicago. More than 14 hours in the jammed seats of steerage. My knees were banging the back of the seat in front of me, and I’m not all that tall. And remember, Etihad has been winning awards for “best airline” this and that. Apparently, however, not for the seating conditions in coach.

Saw parts of three movies, about a half-dozen sitcoms, played 20 games of electronic solitaire (winning the final game), nodded off a time or three … and still the flight dragged on.  If the fastest time on the planet is a condemned man’s final hours, at least in consideration for the slowest is the 15 hours on a transcontinental flight.

(But I did cross over some interesting places I might want to see — just not at 36,000 feet. Basra, Baghdad, the Black Sea, Odessa, the Baltic, Malmo, Oslo, the North Sea, Iceland, the tip of Greenland, Newfoundland, Ontario, Lake Michigan …

Finally got to Chicago (Chih-cah-go, our flight attendance called it) at 3:30 CDT. Stood in the line for passport control, took the people-mover to a domestic terminal, was unable to get on the earlier Chicago-to-LAX flight, spent $2.67 on a bottle of water … sat around, couldn’t decide if I was so tired that I would fall asleep standing up or so tired I was too jittery to fall asleep.

Then another packed-out plane to LAX, a 737 with not one empty seat. Since it’s a domestic flight and no one serves anything except water, soda and juice, we had to bring our own food.

(And, really, how much more would each of us have to pay to get back to having some light meal and a couple of passes through by the crew to see if we’d like a follow-up on that Coke Light? Maybe $20 a head? Wouldn’t you do that, if you knew it meant you were guaranteed a blanket, a pillow and some sort of meal, on a four-hour flight?)

Landed in LAX at 10:30, still the same interminable day. No jetway available, so we parked in the middle of nowhere and transferred to a bus to take us to the terminal, and there’s another 30 minutes. (I hate the “bus at the end of a long flight” concept. One of the worst non-fatal surprises of air travel.) Baggage claim, a wait for another bus to take us to the LAX rental car area … a slow process there, and then off in our Kia Sportage, headed for Long Beach, where we quietly opend the door at 1 a.m. Almost too tired to sleep.

This morning, however, the gentle breezes. Summer the way it ought to be — warm but temperature, bright and inviting. I walked around Belmont Shore to see what was going on, looked at all the happy people who live here year round … envied them a little.

No jobs here, though. U.S. economy is bad, California economy is worse, Long Beach economy is worse yet. So we’re just passing through.

Anyway, if someone asks you today, “Would you like to go to Abu Dhabi?” Check the globe. See how long the layovers are, It’s not a journey to be taken lightly. You need to steel yourself for it. And we get to do it again next month.