The saga continues, and I figure I’m pretty lucky. By the time United gives up on our flights and sends about 375 of us off to hotels, we are pretty much going to bed in the time zone we hope eventually to reach. Last night it was 3:30 a.m. before I hit the bed, after 4 by the time I dozed off.
Most of the workers at the hotel are hispanic, as is this gardener, and do a great job keeping the place maintained
In between the first and second unanticipated layovers, I had a chance to meet three young people who made me feel very hopeful about what they will do with the part of the world they have been handed.
Purpose and openness
I met the first when I slipped into a café at the airport for some sushi and edamame. On Super Bowl Sunday, any place with a TV monitor is popular, but I managed to snag a table sufficiently off to the side no fan would touch it.
I had just tucked into the edamame when a young woman sat down at the next table. When I handed her the menu, she asked the usual travel question about my destination. Some chemistry was at work, and soon we were deep into a discussion about technology, food security, social justice, and supportive relationships.
She was on her way to London to meet with an international team planning an information technology project, a field she had entered when she realized medicine was not her passion. Her husband, an IT consultant, thought she would enjoy his field. He was right, and that small exchange led to her telling me about growing up in India, being the pampered youngest child. Her doting parents promised her a good marriage, and they arranged it well on all counts. As she left to catch her flight, she said she rarely bothers talking with people when she travels. I understood and felt happy she had asked that first question. She has a strong sense of purpose, a heart full of love, and an openness that bodes well for those who meet her.
The golf caddy
The plane-load of people bumped from the previous night’s flight by engine troubles were mostly smiling broadly as we boarded Flight 839 for Sydney. I’d been given a roomy seat behind the bulkhead that separates the flyers with deep pockets and what United calls Economy Plus. I settled into a window seat next to two young men traveling on business.
The young fellow next to me pulled out an iPad. I immediately spotted an app I also like, Epicurious, and saw he had some other familiar apps. We started talking food and cooking, then on to books and our shared interest in photography. He was on his way to a golf tournament in Sydney. I’d never met a professional caddy before and was fascinated to hear him talk about the challenges of combining fatherhood with a travel schedule that has him flying 27 weeks of the year.
But it was the dream that really caught me. I won’t share it here because it’s his to name, not mine. But when he showed me the first efforts that prompted it, I could honestly say to him I thought he had what it would take to make that dream a reality.
T-shirt conversation starter
No one's in the pool on this cool Los Angeles day, but it still looks inviting
We chatted and waited, waited and chatted. “Flap problems,” the captain said. More waiting. “I’m optimistic,” he said at 11:51, nine minutes before midnight would signal an end to the crew’s shift and to our hopes of leaving.
At 12:30 people started taking down their carryon bags and standing in the aisles. By 1 a.m. we were back in line inside the airport. This time the fairly cheerful group of the previous night’s wait for hotel and meal vouchers was much quieter. United had canceled our flight instead of “retiming” it. That meant all 375 of us had to be routed onto different flights, from different cities. Tempers were fraying.
In the line behind me was a young man with a t-shirt I recognized was some library’s reading program promotion. The t-shirt turned out to be from a thrift shop, but my question opened a good conversation. The young fellow works for an IT startup company and is headed to Sydney for a six-week holiday with friends.
What put the sparkle in his eyes was a chance to talk about the application he is developing that will allow doctors to input diagnosis, medications, and anything else patients should know into a mobile app. Patients will have a code that gives them private access. Instead of trying to remember what the doctor told them, they’ll just open the app. Lots of details yet to be worked out, but the young fellow had a strong sense of mission and purpose. I’ve no doubt he’ll work out the bugs and make a difference in a lot of lives.
Hope-full
It was my turn to talk with an agent. The fellow in front of me had been snarly and got no sympathy and none of the perks he insisted were his due. (Come on, snarler, multiply those perks by 375 and get real.) The agent was so relieved to be greeted with a friendly smile that she not only handled all my needs very quickly, she ended by putting me in that same roomy row I’d had to give up when our flight was canceled.
Wonder who’ll be sitting next to me on the flight from Los Angeles to San Francisco and on to Sydney and Melbourne, what stories they will have to tell. It doesn’t really matter to me how young or old they are, but yesterday’s encounters made me feel very hopeful for America. So much of the news sounds as if the country has completely lost its senses, but these three young people are evidence of a different and better future.
They give me hope.
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Yes Cathryn, I do believe you are correct in being hopeful for the future.
A man who is making a difference, and gives me hope, is Bill Strickland. He was the UBC Distinguished Speaker last night. An amazing person, do Google him and read about his work.
So happy you are at your destination, safe and with the ones you love!
Cheers,
H.
What an impressive man Bill Strickland is! I’ve put him on my growing list of people who’ll appear on the blog. Sharing the world with people like that – and with you – gives me hope.