This month I had the opportunity to go to Cleveland, OH again to visit my good friend and colleague, Jon. We had a great time with fishing adventures and resetting up his studio. My observations on the travel experience were of another nature, however.
So what about the travel? My takeaway had nothing to do with the airline or airports directly. In fact, I witnessed an act of humility and service that was quite remarkable (you can actually see things when your nose is not pointed at a little glowing screen in front of your face – more on that). And I’m just going to give a shout out to a Southwest Airlines pilot who personally escorted an elderly man in a wheelchair onto the plane for his boarding. I had the opportunity to compliment the captain as I got off following our flight.
But, back to the rather disheartening experience of this travel. I was struck straight on with how isolated we are keeping ourselves around other people – especially if they are someone we don’t know yet. So here we are waiting in the airport with dozens of other people in close proximity to each other and very few people are talking to anyone – even the family/friends they’re traveling with. I only saw one example in the four plane boarding waits where two people were conversing that I don’t think actually knew each other prior. And then we find ourselves literally inches from two other people in the plane seats and one could hope for at least the opportunity to make a bit of small talk – I mean even the smallest talk, like “Good afternoon”, but alas when I’m about to open my mouth I observe both parties have protrusions from their ears or over them. I guess they aren’t going to hear the most basic greeting anyway – let alone any conversation. Here’s one exasperating example of this. Upon arriving in Cleveland the person to my left finally put away all his “toys” and a few words were exchanged about destinations and reasons for our trips and such, and low and behold we had a common interest that could have been talked about for an hour (or other topics), but too late – we’re getting off the plane never to see each other again. Come to think of it, there was one exception on one leg of the journey where a younger man next to me engaged in some interesting talk for at least half of our travel time. He was a pleasant exception.
Now I know there’s different personalities and times for needing solitude or even rest, but this issue of cutting ourselves off from other human beings is quite sad and even alarming. Were we not created as social beings? Why are we pretending we’re not, and hiding behind our distraction walls as if we’re the only person that matters in our little world? Much ado has been made about how awfully isolated we were during the COVID pandemic and the multitude of negative effects. But are we not continuing (what was already happening prior) to keep ourselves apart and even expanding it? As you enter the secure areas of the airport the security video monitors are advising you to pay attention for anything that might be concerning or questionable. Well I would say this is one such activity. Should we not be making better choices? Who knows, we might just actually learn something from a total stranger – thereby enriching our life, and maybe, just maybe we could do the same for another traveler on this journey we call life.
