Flying with the team

Friday Morning:

My cellphone alarm was supposed to kick me into action at 4:30. I was catching a red eye flight to Johannesburg. It did not go off. I don't know why. Fortuitously Rob had set his alarm for 5 as it gave him just enough time between waking up and leaving for the airport at 5:10. It was a bit of a rush for me. I'm sure he was back in bed in less than an hour though, by which time I was probably boarding the plane to Jo'burg.

Things I do when traveling on domestic flights, things I delight in, include carefully selecting reading material from Exclusive Books and burying my head in the chosen book/magazine/newspaper from take-off to landing (stopping only to order coffee/water/juice and to look out the window at times). The girl sitting next to me, our teams production manager, wanted to talk. To bond perhaps. She didn’t know my domestic flight ritual and was very persistent in her efforts to uproot my attention from said reading material (Marie Claire, incase you wondered). The thing I like doing most is walking with purpose down those travelators at OR Thambo (the airport formerly known as Johannesburg International). Don't stand still. I hate that. If you have to then you must MUST stand to the left so that those of us who are walking with purpose can pass on the right. When you are part of a group who stand, as I was that Friday, a group who do no travelator walking at all but rather stand, very spread out nog al, you sometimes have to disassociate yourself from them a bit. I found a sort of compromise by walking (swiftly and with purpose) along each travelator but waiting in between for the group to catch up…

That was how Friday began. It got worse: we were late for our presentation due to rush-hour traffic. Then it got better: the 40 odd Discovery Health executives and medical professionals who watched our presentation loved it. Then it got worse because we had to change it. Then a bit worse. Then better.

Then the group left to catch their flight back to Durban and I caught a taxi to my parent's home. Finally alone, and in a semi-coma, I lay on my old bed in my old room with the ceiling fan whirling warm air around. For the first time in almost 24 hours I there was quiet, no rushing, no scripted words whirling around in my head hoping they’d be remembered. And I slept so well…

Until the electricity tripped and the fan stopped whirling and I almost suffocated in my sleep. I opened the door and went back to sleep...

Till the electricity came on again and set off all the house alarms in Hyde Park and for some reason my brother’s sound system which was on full blast. Then I went to sleep again…

Now, although my cellphone alarm let me down for no apparent reason, my body clock is set resolutely for 6:30am for an even less apparent reason. So my head is fuzzy from all these early mornings, lechaims for my newly engaged sis, farewells for my brother who leaves on Wednesday for a year in Israel and heat- because its 33 degrees in Durban today (not counting the degrees you add on for humidity).

Big stories, long blog, thanks for sticking with me if you did.

Have a good week!