Holiday Travel Zen
Getting there and getting there well
I was trying to place my carefully folded sport coat into the overhead. I don’t like to show up in meetings looking like I slept in my clothes. When you start your day at 3:45 AM and put in a ½ day of travel before even getting to your first meeting this can be a challenge.
There was a small round woman insistently pushing herself and her bag by me, actually more like through me. She had her jaw gravely set and was practicing travel skills most likely honed in the Guatemalan public transit bus system, or perhaps the morning subway crush of commuter Tokyo.
Even after I secured my aisle seat I was treated to close up views of large butts and near fatal swipes with over-burdened handbags. I cringed and shrank as Grandma tried to wrestle some non-standard bag of hand-made holiday knick knacks smelling of moth balls into the overhead. Look out below!
Holiday travel. It is when the rookies invade the system. It is when my business travel world is invaded by aliens from another existence.
My friend in the middle seat next to me is a big guy. He is very uncomfortable and invades my elbow room and airspace. I’m forced to lean into the aisle to avoid his immenseness and subsequently get bashed by the service cart for my trespass.
I’m having my own obesity crisis. In addition to the ample man beside me a well fed couple is seated in front and the seats groan threateningly. Gosh, I feel petite at 6 ft, 180 pounds.
When we land we are late. An angry mob of middle-aged women and hen-pecked husbands firmly believe that if they can get past me they will make their connection.
I keep repeating the same lines like a mantra. Relax folks. It will be ok. We are all going the same place. We all have flights. We all want to see our families again. None of us wants to be trapped in a metal cigar tube with 200 smelly, chattering strangers. Relax. Relax. Patience.
For I’ve found that some days you make your connection and some days you don’t. Some days you get the obese man, but some days it’s a cute 110 pound coed or even better an empty seat. Some days you get upgraded to first class and some days it rains and your flight gets canceled. But, for the most part it is out of your control, and life goes on.
What can you bring with you to make it all easier? Less stuff is always a good bet. And bring a book, something small like a paperback that you can leave in a seat-back-pocket and not miss. Bring your laptop or iPad or other mobile device and make sure your batteries are charged. Bring some music. For music doth calm the savage beast.
But most assuredly, most importantly, bring your patience in great buckets because the frailties of human nature will test you. The vicissitudes of things entirely out of your control will stretch you calm. Strap on your Zen helmet and assume the attitude of the Buddha.
And I will see you out there.
Chris,
Chris Russell lives and trains in suburban Massachusetts with his family and Border collie Buddy. Chris is the author of “The Mid-Packer’s Lament”, and “The Mid-Packer’s Guide to the Galaxy”, short stories on running, racing, and the human comedy of the mid-pack. Chris writes the Runnerati Blog at www.runnerati.com. Chris’ Podcast, RunRunLive is available on iTunes and at www.runrunlive.com. Chris also writes for CoolRunning.com (Active.com) and is a member of the Squannacook River Runners and the Goon Squad.
Email me at cyktrussell at Gmail dot com
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Amen. The only way you can get through it is to keep breathing (not too deeply – it astonishes me how smelly humans are when squished together like cattle).
Happy Zen Thanksgiving to you.