"If you've never missed a plane, then you are spending too much time in airports." This was a saying about travel that I have come to appreciate, which I heard from Patrick Winston, one of my graduate advisors. He is also the one who taught me the secret of avoiding jet-lag on overnight flights, so I take his advice quite seriously.
So far, I am still apparently spending too much time on airplanes, but today was closer than I've ever been before, leaving MIT at 4:50pm to catch a 5:55pm flight at Boston Logan. Fortunately, traffic wasn't too bad, and I even had 5 minutes at the gate before I boarded, but it reminded me why I do still spend more time in airports than Patrick would suggest: the cost of missing a flight and getting home too late is just too much for my preference. These days, I err instead on the side of shaving things close in my presence at meetings, and omit the time I might have allocated for touring or getting to know my environment, because I don't want to spend the time away from home and those I love.
How young is too young to fly with me to a conference? I don't yet know, and I'm not sure I'd want to put Harriet through the absolute boredom that my packed traveling days would generally entail on her behalf (I never even get full nights of sleep when I'm traveling professionally), but I keep thinking about it, and trying to figure out when and how I can make it sane for her to join me and get to see the world as her father does.
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| Sunset takeoff at Boston Logan |
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