The Upside

Her name is Sam.  I’ve been on her flights before but haven’t spoken to her.  As it turns out, her ex-husband is a Marine on his 3^rd tour of Afghanistan and her mom is taking her place tonight at her daughter’s soccer game.  She lives in Detroit.  Her day started in Detroit, then ATL, IAD, JFK back to IAD, back to ATL and back to Detroit.  I thought I had a long day – it must really suck to be a flight attendant.  She’s cute.  Nice.  I’m her “friend” now.

I told her I was an architect and she apparently thought that meant something.  “You must be good at math.” No, math is stupid. (myth #1).  “I bet you have a really cool house.” (myth #2).  “Well at least you’re rich.” (myth #3).  But who am I to tell her otherwise?  If being an architect makes me interesting to her then so be it.  I’m not really.  I’m absolutely fascinating for about (5) minutes then I even start to lose interest in what I’m saying.  I did though once convince a flight attendant that I was Jon Bon Jovi from LA to Dallas and we all know that’s ridiculous.  (Interesting, but ridiculous.)

I’m on the same flights all the time.  I see the same people all the time.  ATL-IAD is effectively a commuter flight so I see the same pilots, flight attendants, passengers, janitors, etc, etc ad nauseum.  It’s boring.  “Travel” was the one perk that I believed in.  Northern Virginia doesn’t constitute travel in my opinion.  I’m up early, I’m home late.  Nobody on-site really gives a shit about what the architect thinks.  The GC couldn’t possibly be bothered with building from my drawings.  I could continue to piss and moan for hours but I won’t.  My job could certainly be worse.

So yeah, these “travel” days suck.  The upside is that for no apparent reason pretty girls think I’m cool and I rarely have to pay for my nightcap.  When we are all “friends” we help each other out.  All I do is show up.  By the time I sit down at M+E’s, Sophia has a drink in front of me.  I can sit in the back of the plane and I get served first because we are “friends”.  I show up and listen.  The men in their lives must really be assholes.  I pretend to care and get whatever I want for free. 

I think that makes me an asshole.  The upside is…maybe there’s not an upside based on what I just said.

The upside is that I for once actually listened to the other person tonight.  (That’s a start, no?)  There is hope for me yet!

Sam was cool.  Of course I will probably never be on one of her flights again now.  The downside is that I didn’t ask her how she felt about not being there for her kid’s soccer game.  The upside is that I talked to her long enough to know how she would answer.  And that makes her a rock star in my opinion. 

The upside is the elusive obvious that we fail to see even though it kicks us in the face on the daily.