A few closing thoughts
A couple of things popped into my mind as I was gliding across the Atlantic that I felt were worth sharing.
The first happened as I was walking up Lower St. George's Street towards Dame and my place along the parade route. A very non-descript middle-aged man was whistling a song that immediately caught my attention and got stuck in my brain. I kept running and running it over and over as the blocks passed by, knowing it but not quite placing it. Trying hard to place lyrics to it in order to break my mental block, it finally came to the answer - Love Me Do by the Beatles. The man was short, oddly dressed, balding with a comb-over and thick glasses and here he is whistling Love Me Do while strolling down the street. I'd say it was like a scene from a movie, but I'm not sure what movie it would be.
The second had to do with our parade crowd companions. A couple of Irish women were near us with their children and it was wonderful to experience the parade through the kids reactions. We had some great conversations about their families in Tucson and their two boys who were identical twins despite being a year and a half apart but the most special one was a little girl who yelled wildly with each passing float. Getting tired, her mum picked her up and set her on the barrier, "Mum," she said, "You're making my poop cold," referring to her bum that was getting exposed to the cold wind. We all cracked up and Mum added that it was probably too much information for the crowd.
All of this stuff just drives home the point about how great it is to get out on the road. Yesterday was a tough slog home, made tougher by the lateness of my departure, my layover gap dwindling away, the nightmare of watching the time tick by as I was stuck in the international departure section in Atlanta, the furious haul on the subway from terminal E to A and the calf burning run to gate 27 (why can't I ever go out from gate 2?) to be the next to last person to board my connection.
While you're sitting there hearing those words "we apologize for the delay", your spirits sink. But when you snatch victory from the jaws of disaster and make it home to the ones you love, you realize it's all worth it. We just need to remember that the goal is to simply keep moving.
The first happened as I was walking up Lower St. George's Street towards Dame and my place along the parade route. A very non-descript middle-aged man was whistling a song that immediately caught my attention and got stuck in my brain. I kept running and running it over and over as the blocks passed by, knowing it but not quite placing it. Trying hard to place lyrics to it in order to break my mental block, it finally came to the answer - Love Me Do by the Beatles. The man was short, oddly dressed, balding with a comb-over and thick glasses and here he is whistling Love Me Do while strolling down the street. I'd say it was like a scene from a movie, but I'm not sure what movie it would be.
The second had to do with our parade crowd companions. A couple of Irish women were near us with their children and it was wonderful to experience the parade through the kids reactions. We had some great conversations about their families in Tucson and their two boys who were identical twins despite being a year and a half apart but the most special one was a little girl who yelled wildly with each passing float. Getting tired, her mum picked her up and set her on the barrier, "Mum," she said, "You're making my poop cold," referring to her bum that was getting exposed to the cold wind. We all cracked up and Mum added that it was probably too much information for the crowd.
All of this stuff just drives home the point about how great it is to get out on the road. Yesterday was a tough slog home, made tougher by the lateness of my departure, my layover gap dwindling away, the nightmare of watching the time tick by as I was stuck in the international departure section in Atlanta, the furious haul on the subway from terminal E to A and the calf burning run to gate 27 (why can't I ever go out from gate 2?) to be the next to last person to board my connection.
While you're sitting there hearing those words "we apologize for the delay", your spirits sink. But when you snatch victory from the jaws of disaster and make it home to the ones you love, you realize it's all worth it. We just need to remember that the goal is to simply keep moving.
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