I’m flying across the Atlantic as I write this and it struck me that I don’t know how many times I’ve done this over the years. Many. This is the 4th time so far this year. The undertaking itself is impressive still, but also routine in a fashion. The experience has become normal for me, it’s just what happens sometimes. For many it’s extraordinary, and I run into people on an almost a daily basis that have never done it.
It’s a shame when we don’t notice the adjustment, that movement from something ceasing to be spectacular and special and don’t acknowledge it. There remain many things I’d like to do that I’d consider to be extraordinary still, but experience and age has even dulled the shine off of some of these.
Someone like Graham Greene who had a fantastic eye for the human condition would appreciate the melancholy created from having achieved much of what you want. He’d have served it with warmer irony than I’m able to muster as well. Were this story his, this text would be found floating in the swells from where the wreckage washed ashore.
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