Flight Time

It’s another Saturday night in Chicago.  As is quite common here in December, the snow has been falling all day.  Well, I guess all week is more like it.  There must be at least ten inches of it on the ground out there.  It looks beautiful from the window of my hi-rise apartment, but not so beautiful to try and walk through.  I flew home from three days of business meetings in L.A. on Wednesday night, just one day before a Southwest Airlines passenger jet skidded off the runway during its landing and crashed through a barrier at Midway Airport, killing a six year-old boy.

I came in on the same kind of plane, same airline, same runway.  The story is all over the news.  It’s at these times, among others, that I think about what I’d do if my son were ever severely injured.  Not a pleasant thought.  And worse, what would it be like if something tragic ever happened to me?  I’m traveling to some city at least twice per month, sometimes more, yet something seems to always envelop and protect me.  No one could ever convince me that angels don’t exist.  They just have a presence.

Want to hear something funny?  The highly respected publication, Today’s Chicago Woman magazine, has named me one of “Chicago’s Top 50 Most Savvy Singles” for 2006.  So, I’ll be profiled in the February 2006 edition.  This is the same magazine that named me one of this city’s “Top 50 Most Eligible Bachelors” in 2000.  I’m probably thinking things through too much, but how savvy can I truly be, to still be single five years after I was first featured?  I’m such a cynic.  That’s probably part of my problem.  Still, I’m genuinely honored and humbled.  There’s only one place that acknowledgments like these come from, and I trust that the ancestors have a hand in it.

Oh, well.  It’s movie time.  I have popcorn, DVD and cigar in hand.  Good night all.