A Day in the Life of Chaos

There is a small liberal arts university in Salem Oregon named Willamette.  It was the first major step in my process of breaking away from my parents and becoming my own man.  While I only spent my freshman and my senior year there I look back now at Willamette with great fondness.  My classes were small and personal.  My professors cared deeply about what they taught and the environment was one of intellectual growth.  Willamette is a little treasure built around a winding creek that flows through the campus.  It is an oasis of old trees, brick buildings and Oregon history nestled in the shadow of the Oregon State Capitol.  I studied history and politics.  I worked for a State Senator in the capitol writing letters to consituents and researching policy.  Most importantly, Willamette was a university that pushed its students to write.  Somewhere in the endless term papers and essays I learned that writing was the most important skill I would ever have. In the midst of my four ye

I stopped enjoying traveling for work a long time ago.   In retrospect, how can anyone top flying in a Vietnam era helicopter with the door open watching parrots fly over the South American jungle? To those that are set in their daily routines the idea of going someplace and getting paid for it is enticing.  It is a chance to stay in nice hotels and visit different places all on the dime of another.  I suppose it was once that way for myself but now it feels like a dreadful chore I can't wait to get over.   There is a difference between traveling when you can be yourself, free to go when and where you want and the cold realities of business travel.  Traveling as part of a job leaves little time for personal pleasures and has a goal of simply accomplishing a task.  There is also a great difference between traveling with a friend or a lover with whom you can share a memory and traveling by yourself.   For me, solitary travel when you are not destined to meet a friend on the other end