GLASGOW — You don’t want to take a bump to your head. That’s for sure. And you don’t want your car to get bumped in the parking lot. That’s not good.
Yet, not all bumps turn out to be a bad thing. Consider the bump I experienced during a trip to Houston last week.
Rather than take off on my originally scheduled flight, I got bumped for one that took off an hour and a half later. When I finally landed in Texas, I came off the plane with an airline voucher that will take me on my next round trip. That paid off at around $200 per hour for my waiting time. Not bad!
Being stalled a short while along the way is only a minor inconvenience. I simply consider it part of the adventure of traveling.
There was a paperback book inside my jacket’s pocket as a backup traveling companion, although I never got through even one chapter. There were too many stories to be heard right there among fellow travelers.
Strangers may seem reluctant to share their stories with one another while making the ups and downs in an elevator. It probably has to do with the brief time shared and the somewhat uncomfortable crowding into intimate space.
Given a bit more time and a bit more space, though, likely those same strangers will freely engage in conversations. They will tell their stories, and sometimes they will offer surprising revelations about themselves.
Who needs a John le Carré novel when seated beside someone like one of my seat mates during my recent trip? For a time, he had worked as a spy. He spun thrilling tales of suspense concerning his covert actions in a foreign country.
Perhaps not as exciting, but quite interesting nevertheless, was my encounter with another fellow traveler. This one was a librarian who seemed to almost dread returning home. The sprinkler system had been mistakenly activated in her library and the books were drenched. She said the plan was to have them freeze-dried, but she worried it would not save the soggy pages. We talked about mold, silver fish and other enemies book collectors fight.
Tales of tangled romances were in the air, as well. A young couple directly in the seat behind were trying to better understand a relationship. It was impossible not to hear what was being discussed, just as it was impossible not to conclude that the therapeutic ramblings were a vain attempt to believe what they both knew was untrue.
Nearby in the terminal, sat a couple of teenage girls. No doubt they had stories to tell, as well. But they weren’t about to share. Each was plugged into electronic gadgetry, sitting silently as they listened to that which I could not hear. Their imaginations seemed somewhere further away than even an airplane can fly.
I don’t know where I’ll fly next. I just know that it will be compliments of the airline company. And, of course, I know that I don’t need to pack a book. There will be stories all around me.
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Not all bumps are a bad thing
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