I very rarely go on business trips at this point in my career. When I was in publishing right out of college I saw quite a bit of this country, albeit paying the price by standing and smiling at a booth in a subterranean exhibit hall with concrete floors for three days at a time. By the end I would be grumpy and give off an air of "Don't come near me because I don't have it in me anymore to pretend to be interested in what you're saying." However, I made a friend who worked for a major publishing company who used to pack up cartons of books for me and send them to me after the show was over. Thank you, friend, for that.
I stayed in decent hotels and had an expense account and time to roam about some great cities. When I worked for a British publishing company, I went to Oxford, twice, and spent a week at the main office. Later, after switching careers to work for a national non-profit that served at-risk youth from the poorest cities in the country, I had the amazing privilege, and they were nothing less than a privilege, of watching these young people blossom from former gang leaders and the like, into major forces of policy change. To this day, I can't believe my good fortune in being able to lead a group of four young people from the backwoods of Maine and Vermont around Capitol Hill to watch them meet with their Senators in order to advocate for more youth funding in their communities (The only issue with that trip is that no staff were allowed to drink for that week, no matter how far and wide we would have traveled to sit down with a shot of tequila or glass of wine).
In January of this year I was sent to Richmond, Virginia for a 5-day training. The flight was short, under an hour, so my intense fear of flying barely had a chance to kick-in (valium and wine always help). I traveled alone, had a cool rental car, and felt completely independent to do my thing on our off-time. I could go to my room, plop on a perfectly made bed, and not talk to another human being until I chose to. Some people who know me would be a bit surprised at my avoidance of social situations, but those who know me WELL, know that Gayle needs her alone time or else she turns into a beast. They cast me a wide berth and build it into their own schedules when we are together. You know who you are and I love you for it.
In Richmond I ate alone, quite happily, nursing a glass or two of wine, doing crossword puzzles. I was accountable to noone and my one obligation was to show up to the training on time, which I did every day. The second the daily session was over, even though it was a wonderful training, I'd high-tail it to my car and drive back to the hotel. I wanted no chit-chat, no small talk. Besides a nice dinner with two of my trainers, the most back-and-forth I had was ordering my food from my server and saying goodnight to my husband and daughter. With the automated wake-up calls, I didn't even have to say thank you to anyone.
I just returned from a 4-day long trip to Cincinnati for a refresher training in what I learned in Richmond. This time there were four of us, including my boss (who I adore). For months we've had monthly Web conferences with our two outposted coworkers so until then they had just been faces in little boxes on my computer screen. I didn't realize how much I would like them until I met them in person and realized that they had actual bodies.
We stayed at the same hotel and had one rental car between us, all forced to navigate through a city that none of us had ever been to. We met in the lobby for breakfast at the same time every day, asked the "how'd you sleep question" of each other, and left for our training at the same time. My boss somehow ended up being the driver the whole trip with our lovely co-worker in the passenger seat. They relied on Siri and Google maps to serve as our GPS but on our first day driving through the University of Cincinnati campus we remained stymied for about 1/2 hour on how to get to the building where we were supposed to go. We drove in circles, passing maintenance men who could have pointed us in the right direction within minutes of our confusion.
From here on in, you need to imagine everything that I'm quoted as saying in a soft murmur from the backseat where I sat next to our male co-worker. What I say will be in parentheses and lower case to further emphasize the ineffectiveness of my opinion:
("why don't you ask that guy for directions?")
"The map says we should take a left here. Left, left!"
"OOPS!"
("i think we're going in circles. look, there's someone we can ask.")
"Sorry guys! Wow, look how gorgeous that track is!"
This goes on for quite a while until we find a garage to park in.
"What's the name of the building again?"
("the sign ahead says we can get there if we take that staircase.")
"Let's call (the trainer) because I can't remember the name of the building. I need more coffee!"
"HAHAHA Me too!"
It took us until the third day to avoid this conversation.
At lunch, it became:
"I think the place we want to go is that way."
("no, it's this way.")
"Didn't (our trainer) say it's that way?"
("no. she said it was this way.")
I observed, every day, as the three of them argued over who would pay for coffee, pushing cash back and forth across the table, until one of them would stuff the cash in their wallet, pay for the coffee with their own money, give the cash back to the other only to be greeted by "Why did you do that? You didn't have to do that! I'll buy you a drink later!" (I assume that these small purchases could be expensed anyway, as lovely as the gestures were.)
So, on and on this went, in the context of dinners, airport runs, car rental returns, departure gates and seat assignments.
Being the youngest child and having bouts of feeling unheard on the rare occasions when I'm with my three (wonderful) siblings in similar situations, I get very pouty and retreat in exactly the same way. That obviously has much more history behind it than the trip I just came off of so it has much greater impact until the next time it happens.
Sometimes I feel as if I don't play well with others. Everyone likes to be heard. This is the reason I never join book groups and I always shy away from girly-getaways if there are more than two other people involved. I'm honest about it, though, and people seem not to judge. In middle-age, we've all developed our quirks and needs and can even use the aging process as a fallback. "I'm almost 50, I go to sleep at 9:30" (I've always gone to sleep at 9:30). "I'm almost 50. I can't go to TWO bars in one night." (I've never gone to two bars in one night).
I've often felt as if my needed alone time has made me miss out on some fun, especially in my 20s and 30s, but I know my limits and needs. A lot of the anecdotes about people getting so drunk that they threw up in bushes or on each other made me realize that maybe it wasn't so much fun. On this trip when my boss rallied the others to work out at 6:30 each morning and take pre-dinner walks, I didn't feel guilty about not joining them. It certainly didn't seem as if I was missing out on any "fun."
I feel lucky that I have a job where I am valued enough to be sent on these types of trips. The investment my organization is making in me shows that I have real staying power there and it makes me feel more secure than I have in a long time. Maybe it's not that important to be right all the time even when I know I am. Maybe it's okay to drive around in circles for 20 minutes even though I know that where we're trying to get to is right in front of our face. Maybe it's okay to laugh along with the silly statements about coffee. Truth be told, maybe if I had had more coffee, I wouldn't be speaking in parentheses.
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