When I am getting ready for a work trip I am this combination of excited and stressed. It takes time and energy to prepare - securing visas, booking airline tickets and hotels, getting any missing shots and medications, shopping for toiletries, packing, organizing work papers, preparing things around the house for your departure, etc. It does not matter how many times I have done this before. Some things become somewhat routine, but it still takes up precious time and energy. Time away from my routine life and my family and friends. Energy away from the present.
And there is always this part of me that doesn't want to go, right up until I am getting on the plane I am asking myself why am I doing this, why am I disrupting my life, why am I leaving my loved ones, why am I taking any kind of risk like this? I am not afraid to travel or fly - never have been. But I am also a bit morbid in my general thinking - I've been called "worst case Wendy." I just have this tendency to think about the worst thing that could happen in a situation. For some reason it helps me be prepared, to accept things and move on. So, when I am getting on that plane for every work trip I think to myself - well this could be it. You could go down in this plane so accept it and be ready for it. Again, it is not about fear of flying, it is just staring the possibility directly in the face and accepting it. I do that when I fly for personal travel too. It is not just work trips, it is any trip. But it just seems harsher and more unfair if you were to go down on a work trip rather than your vacation. That sounds really stupid, doesn't it? Because if you are dead, you are dead and it doesn't matter if it was during a work trip or a personal trip - it will still suck.
When I was single again, work travel was great. Work travel only really becomes a problem when you have loved ones at home who you want to be with - a partner/spouse, kids - or when you have things going on that continuous travel really disrupts - pets, hobbies, fitness goals. A lot of Paul's friends work in the film business. Some of those people go off to work on these films in different locations for months at a time - all the time. We sometimes talk about parallels between the international development and film worlds - how some people have to always be traveling and how this can ruin their personal lives. This is why I have seriously cut back my work travel and will continue to do so. I don't want work to ruin my personal life.
Two weeks isn't a long time, but sometimes it can seem like forever on the road. I will miss my love and will be counting down the minutes until I can be home again with him. Every single action will be about getting back home to this:
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| No business trip is worth leaving this man... |
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