Remember when we were kids and in September when school started we had to write about what we had done on our summer vacation? Everybody wrote the same thing – went swimming, rode bikes, slept in the backyard and read books.
Last week we closed our office for a week so we could attend mandatory events. Perlinda went to unexpected funerals and I went to my brother’s birthday party in Loveland, Colorado. Neither of us got much sleep but getting out of our routine was healthy.
Highlights of my trip were too Even-Steven to pick a winner. It started on the Wednesday airplane ride when I looked up to see that my seat mate had the most beautiful eyes imaginable. The word “Cool” drooled out of my mouth before I thought.
She stared back at me.
She was a German Shepherd, a service dog, and she laid on the floor between me and the woman she was tending. Her name was Nova, and when her woman got up to use the head, Nova had no separation anxiety. She put her head down between her paws and kept her eyes on the aisle until the woman, who runs a horse rescue in Colorado Springs, returned.
On Thursday afternoon, my brother and two of my nephews and I went to the United Airlines Pilot Training Center and rode in a $30 million simulator for two hours. We took turns taking off and landing a Boeing 737 at McCarran International in Las Vegas, Reagan National in Washington, DC, and Inouye International in Honolulu.
The optics included air marshallers (not marshals) who direct planes on the ground; a mile-long freight train; six-lane rush hour traffic; Trump International Hotel; the Washington Monument; Diamond Head; pounding rain – everything you would have to find or avoid if you were taking off or landing in those cities.
The big brother birthday event was Saturday night and our immediate family of 24 was there, including Evgeny, my niece-in-law’s father, who flew in from Moscow and doesn’t speak English. He and my brother are the family patriarchs and have got along for 30 years by communicating with hugs and shrugs.
All the kids toasted Mike. They were emotional, they all said he’s the greatest man, dad, friend, etc. Then it was my turn to toast my brother. I realized that all these people were in the family Mike created and I was the only one from the family he was issued.
Which meant I saw him in an entirely different way. To me he’s the ordinary guy who likes to drink scotch and do crossword puzzles even though he can’t spell.
Vacations are not like they used to be – they’re better.