August 11th, 2013
This is the beginning of a busy season for me, and I am on the road almost constantly for the next couple of weeks. Being the emotional infant that I am, I have a natural range of about four “emotions” when I travel for work; 1- busy working, 2- busy reading, 3- busy sleeping and, 4- irritated. I sometimes let business travel irritate me a lot, and there are a lot of aspects of travel that can be irritating. Delayed flights, cancelled flights, being away from my people, people who drag everything they own onto the plane and then can’t find a place to put it, people who have not achieved the same level of mastery as I have for going through security, horrible airport food, disgusting airport bathrooms, no electrical outlets, long lines, bad hotel beds, etc.
I was on a flight from Omaha to Denver recently and the guy sitting on my left had a giant cast on his right arm. His cast looked exactly like the cast I had to wear after I broke my elbow in high school, so I asked him if he had injured his elbow. He had indeed broken his elbow and proceeded to tell me the story of how he was running through the airport a couple of days earlier to make a connecting flight. He hit a wet spot on the floor, wiped out pretty badly and broke his elbow. Instead of catching his flight, he ended up in the hospital and instead of having a layover in Omaha of a few hurried minutes; it was a couple of days before he was able to continue his travel.
It was a timely reminder to me. Slow down. Chill out. Relax. Appreciate.
Airports, airplanes and hotels are not the best places to spend time, but I only have to go to those places because I have business. People pay me to come and say stuff.
I have a pretty good thing.
Be good to each other.