Flight or Fight

A little more than a year ago, I hailed a cab at 4:30 a.m., pulled my suitcase in after me, and told the driver I needed to get to LaGuardia airport. As we drove up Broadway, he asked me who I was running from.

Excellent question, but where to begin? A more revealing line of inquiry would tap into who and what I am running from.

Early-morning flights always seem like a productive idea at the online-booking stage, especially if you’re in a first-rate mood and sipping coffee or wine at the time. You fall into full-on Carpe Diem mode, figuring that once the aircraft lands you’ll have the entire day ahead of you and this will be a good thing. It’s only the night before the flight, when you’re futzing around at 1 a.m. and realizing you need to physically be inside of the airport in 5 hours, that the gravity of what you’ve gone and done begins to sink in.

What does being a night owl mean to me? I consider myself a martyr every time I wake up before dawn.

Another Martyr Morning has come, I’m in full-on Carpe Zombie mode, no amount of caffeine will snap me out of it, and I can’t sleep on planes. The last time this happened, I made a promise to myself: This is it. I’m never booking an early-morning flight again, and this time I mean it.

I’m much better with the promises I make to others than I am with the ones I make to myself. But New Year’s Resolution season is as good a season as any to bring a new operating strategy to my table.