On A Jet Plane

Some of my friends travel for work. Whether they are TV folks who work in multiple cities, or financial or HR executives who manage people in multiple offices, they live with suitcase at the ready, prepared to cover the bases at home when they are called to get on a plane.

I, on the other hand, have traveled for work only a handful of times over twenty-something years. They have been good trips, to exciting gigs--the opportunities have just rarely presented themselves. I may work many hours, but I work them relatively close to home, rarely in an airport, rarely on the road.

These days, I often field questions about how I survive a schedule that has me working overnights and a life that has me keeping different hours each week. To those questions, I mostly answer "it is what it is." I do what I need to, and what my family needs me to do, to make my own circumstances work, the same way my traveling friends do what they need to do to make their travel, and their families' survival when they travel, work. We each have a particular load that we carry. And we each find ways to be able to carry it.

So, when I field those questions, I remind myself that what I do to make life work is not so different from what others do. Often, others can't imagine staying up all night (and sleeping during the day to compensate). But often, I can't imagine making airports and other cities (and the arrangement this requires at home) a part of my weekly life.

We don't all "leave on a jet plane." But we do all manage the life that our work or other circumstances hand us. So, I guess, in some ways, each one of us is just counting on people to "kiss me and smile for me." Until the next time we "leave on a jet plane." Or don't.