My Travel Day
I just got home from a four-day trip to board meetings for my college, so I missed my usual target of posting these reflections at 4:30 p.m. eastern time on Sundays. I somehow doubt that any of you sit by your phone or computer waiting for my posts to arrive at the appointed hour, or that you even knew there was an appointed hour, so I suspect you won’t mind.
For some reason, when I booked my return flight, I failed to notice that there was a direct flight available, and booked one instead that connected through Newark with a layover. Add to that the time it took me to drive from rural Ohio to the Cleveland Hopkins Airport, and then from Logan Airport home, and I would have done almost as well driving the whole way.
Because my travels and meetings have kept me fully occupied these last few days, I thought I would just tell you a little bit about my day. It had one high point and one low point.
The high point was having a conversation with an elderly woman who worked in the breakfast area in the hotel where I stayed. She decided to strike up a conversation with me, as she apparently has done with other trustees, and she was very sweet. It did not take long for me to realize she very much reminded me of my recently deceased mother-in-law, another sweet, elderly lady, and so I wanted to show this woman kindness, as she was kind herself and clearly wanted to talk. The Dalai Lama says in The Book of Joy (one of my current and highly recommended listens on Audible) that extending kindness to others is one of the keys to happiness. I experienced a little taste of that today, and I hope my new friend did as well.
The low point - well, maybe I won’t go into too much detail. Let’s just say that the little boy who got sick on the plane was considerate enough to wait until after we landed and just a very few minutes before we deplaned, and we can all hope it was just motion sickness. Also, the HVAC seemed still to be running and doing its filtration thing. It was inspiring to see nearby passengers frantically scrambling to find those little blue bags to offer the dad, another lesson in kindness I suppose (or was it self-preservation?). I can empathize with the parents, as I well remember events like this when my now-grown kids were this boy’s age.
Sure, not during a pandemic, but like I said, we can hope.
Happy Sunday everyone.