Saturday, February 12, 2011

Business Travel Memories


Driving out of the Oakland airport through early morning fog and listening to the eerie beginning of "Nixon in China." Being delayed at O'Hare. Opening a hotel room door in Jackson, Mississippi late one night and finding a young woman asleep in the bed. (I quietly backed out.) Being stranded in Atlanta due to thunderstorms. Being delayed at O'Hare. A beautiful drive along the Gulf from Beaumont to Houston. Going through the Holland Tunnel. The Buddy Holly statue in Lubbock. Spending the night at the World Trade Center. Standing in a Detroit highrise and looking over into Canada. Rocketing out of the John Wayne Airport due to its bizarre take-off rules. The changing leaves in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Maine. The Lincoln Fox sculpture at the Albuquerque airport. Being delayed at O'Hare. The lemon cake in the hotel restaurant at L'Enfant Plaza. The marvelous view on the flight from Seattle to Anchorage. Finding a stranger's address book tucked inside a fold of my suitcase. Interviewing workers at a cotton gin in La Mesa, Texas. The passenger on the Honolulu flight who thought he was going to Indianapolis. A cabbie in Puerto Rico who was a master of trivia. The New Jersey conference room with a partially collapsed wall. The green hills behind the Kahala Hilton. Watching an old man with a cane dancing near the River Walk in San Antonio. The wired-up workshop audiences in New York and Los Angeles. The Miami Beach hotel that was surrounded by vultures. The ultra-polite audiences in San Juan. The egrets in the swamp land south of New Orleans. Finding a client's office on an old plantation site in the Mississippi Delta. The first view of Pittsburgh. A scary trip through a late night thunderstorm in Montana. The tunnels of Houston. Being delayed at O'Hare.

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