We’ll fret about making connecting flights. Maybe we’ll mutter a critique on modern air travel or rant about booking a route that involves different carriers and a shuttle ride or run through a concourse obstacle course that would challenge even the finest show dog at Westminster.
Then, there are other situations where we experience a missed connection as a profound loss even though the likelihood of events following our fantasy script are more than improbable.
Missed Connection notes on local websites might feature short and direct pleas like, “Girl in the yellow sundress, riding the red line downtown last Monday at 8:00 AM. I think you’re the one. The guy with the curly black hair and silver Yeti water bottle.”
Feeling justifiably sorry for yourself over uncontrollable forces that prevented you from getting what you wanted or possibilities that never blossomed is not the point. Is it?
That’s not really at the heart of a missed connection.
A few weeks ago, I received an email from a woman who was on my tour to Northern Spain and Portugal last October.
She had a traveling companion, a roommate, but we hung out together a lot. She had also lived in Chicago, my hometown, for years and recognized some of my references.
Currently making her home in Albuquerque, she knew the difference between Rogers Park and Hyde Park and understood, flatlander that I am, why it was often hard for me to look out the window of our motor coach speeding along narrow bridges over the Douro Valley and really take in how steep a drop it was on both sides.
I’m going to be coming to Chicago next week, she explained. My aunt is turning a hundred and the family is getting together.I’m staying with my sister who lives in northwest Indiana so I’m not sure how often, or if, I will get into the city.
I was happy to hear from her. So often, you exchange contact information with people you meet at a conference or on a tour and never talk to them again.
She didn’t have her own car and had tons of obligations over her five-day stay, but I was hopeful we might be able to get together.
I offered to meet her at O’Hare for breakfast or an overpriced Cinnabon before she left town. For me, a trip to the airport was relatively easy. I was so happy about spending some face-to-face time, even forty-five minutes, with someone with whom I felt simpatico.
We promised to stay in touch.
The weekend came and went. Following my normal routine, I took my dog out for our morning walk around 7:45 on her last day in Chi-town and came back home to find a message on my cell.
In her voicemail, my friend expressed apologies that we couldn’t hook up, noting that her short visit was more than full. She reiterated her open invitation for me to visit her in New Mexico. Maybe, we could go up in a hot air balloon some October during Albuquerque’s International Balloon Fiesta.
I could have called her back before her flight boarded, but I figured we could always make time for a phone call when we both felt relaxed.
Within a couple weeks, I created an email list of people that might be interested in joining me for classical music and wine at Millennium Park. I invited some friends over for dinner. I pinned another friend down for a lunch date when her consulting gig took her closer to my side of town.
Not getting to see my travel friend, reminded me how much I needed to feel belonging. I decided to take small actions that might make me feel more CONNECTED. I thought about the term “Missed Connections.”
it’s not about something OUT THERE; poor timing or ill-willed forces at play. It’s about something INSIDE. We can use any event, even one that didn’t turn out as planned, as a prompt to focus on what’s in front of us.
There’s really only one possible understanding of a “missed connection.” That is, a failure to recognize the message of the moment, stopping short of making an association between your mind and heart and your present circumstances.
So, I renew my pledge daily — to notice my surroundings and how I feel.
Knowing that each second contains a gift, a new opportunity, even if that is changing plans, is no small thing.
Loved reading the post. It happens to me a lot too. Nothing ever works as planned and things change everyday. I try to get up and take one day at a time . Sometimes that helps me just to feel focused on what I need to do for that very day.
Loved reading the post. It happens to me a lot too. Nothing ever works as planned and things change everyday. I try to get up and take one day at a time . Sometimes that helps me just to feel focused on what I need to do for that very day.