Joy and Wonder at the Detroit Airport

Posted on December 10, 2012 by zoeweil
Image courtesy random letters via Creative Commons.

I travel on average about a week each month for work, which means I spend a lot of time in airports. Travel has become more and more challenging and unpleasant (crowded planes and tighter seats, delays, hours spent on runways, meager food service even on long trips, etc.), but the airports themselves have become more and more pleasant and accommodating. LaGuardia has a huge salad bar with lots of options for vegans like me; chair massage spas are popping up all over; and free wifi and charging stations are expanding, making it possible to work during layovers and not have my computer run out of battery power.

It’s because of these changes that I don’t mind long layovers. They’re less stressful than short layovers, during which I’m too often running a mile through a terminal with my backpack on and my wheeled suitcase behind me saying, “Excuse me! Excuse me!” as I race to make a tight connection.

Recently, I had a long layover at the Detroit Airport, which is my favorite airport in the U.S. Why? Because of two artistic additions. In the atrium in the very middle of the airport there is a fountain that I could stare at for hours. The plumes of water are like dancers, beautifully and surprisingly choreographed. But it is the tunnel connecting Terminal A to Terminals B and C that often fills me with joy and wonder. Joy and wonder? In an airport?!

As one descends the long escalator to the tunnel, one is greeted by a music and light show. The translucent walls of the tunnel are designed to look like a cross between a seascape, a mountainscape, and a cloudscape, and behind the walls are ever-changing lights in a rainbow of colors. Choreographed to the music, the lights illuminate the walls and ceiling, undulating, moving, dancing. It is a gorgeous work of art.

So when I am not in a rush, I stand still on the moving walkway and just watch. And no matter how far I have traveled, how long or arduous the journey, or whether I have spent a night in an airport hotel because I’ve missed a connection somewhere, I always smile.

I’m aware that the tunnel may be using more electricity than if it were simply lit with fluorescent lights. I’m aware that such extra use of energy takes its toll; but I appreciate that the planners of this airport thought to bring art into our experience, and that this art makes a world of difference.

Yes, I experience joy and wonder in the Detroit airport. Imagine that.

~ Zoe

Zoe Weil, President, Institute for Humane Education
Author of Most Good, Least Harm, Above All, Be Kind, and The Power and Promise of Humane Education
My TEDxConejo talk: “Solutionaries”
My TEDxDirigo talk: “The World Becomes What You Teach“
My TEDxYouth@BFS “Educating for Freedom”

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Detroit Airport Friday vs. Sunday

Posted on June 18, 2010 by zoeweil

Last Friday night I was traveling to Minneapolis for the Their Lives, Our Voices conference. I had a tight connection in Detroit, and the forecast called for thunderstorms in both Detroit and Minneapolis. I was worried. But it was beautiful in Bangor, so I began to feel more confident about everything staying on schedule. Then a fuel sensor was broken on the plane, and we were delayed out of Bangor for an hour. We arrived in Detroit 25 minutes before my next plane was scheduled to take off.

Carrying my luggage, my props for my talks, and my way-too-heavy computer, I ran from the farthest most gate in terminal C to my connecting gate on the far end of terminal A. I knew that if I didn’t make the flight, chances were that I wouldn’t make it to Minneapolis in time for my keynote address first thing in the morning. There was a pregnant woman on my first flight also trying to make the flight to Minneapolis, and I promised to let them know she was on her way if the doors to the plane were still open, as I knew I’d get there first. Fortunately, when I arrived at the gate, albeit drenched with sweat, they were still boarding, and I was able to get on the plane. However, because they had switched airplanes and the new one was smaller, everyone in rows 42 and higher was bumped off the flight. I was lucky my seat was in row 22, and I felt for the other passengers who wouldn’t be able to make it to Minneapolis that night. Just as I was boarding, I saw the pregnant woman. They’d bumped her off the flight because they assumed she wouldn’t make it due to the delay in the first flight. She pointed me out to them, saying I was on the same flight and they were letting me on. At that point, I decided I couldn’t get involved and risk being bumped off myself. I dashed onto the plane, hoping for the best for this woman, but doing nothing to assist her. When I saw her board the plane, I was relieved. She said that being pregnant had its perks; she used her pregnancy to convince them to let her on.

Thirty-six hours later, I was returning home, and my layover in Detroit was 3.5 hours. I felt stress-free. I took my time finding a place to get a vegan meal and was delighted to find an actual peanut butter and jelly restaurant. Then I stopped at a store to buy a new pair of reading glasses because mine had broken on the first flight. When I paid the cashier he told me he was heartbroken. “Why? I asked. “Because I had my ten minute break, and I went to get a Frappuccino, and the line at Starbucks was too long so I couldn’t get it.” I offered to get it for him, and off I went, still carrying all my luggage, but without any need to hurry. He was very happy when I brought it to him, and he shared that after his shift was over he had to be at another job at midnight. He had really needed that pick-me-up.

I decided to treat myself to a back massage at the Detroit aiport “spa” because my neck and shoulders hurt a lot after the breakneck run with my computer and luggage on Friday. The woman who was giving the massage was so stressed out. Her electricity had gotten turned off at home, and she was unable to reach an actual person at the utility company, and she couldn’t receive calls at work, and she was running behind. She worried that her energy was so stressed it would impact my massage, but I reassured her and just let her vent. At the end of the massage she told me she felt so much better and was really grateful to me because I’d made her feel so much calmer.

On Friday night, I wouldn’t have stopped to help a soul. I might have run right by a person who’d tripped, a child who was lost, or someone having a heart attack, just hoping another would help. On Sunday, I would probably have been available to help anyone I passed at the airport, open as I was in my stress-free state to see the people around me.

This reminds me that often, those people we think are inconsiderate, rude, or unhelpful may simply be very stressed, while those who are kind and compassionate may simply be in a space in which they can let these qualities shine. As Philo of Alexandria once said, “Be kind, for everyone is fighting a great battle.” I think this also means that we can be kind to ourselves when the battle we are fighting eclipses our own kindness and goodness. I was not especially kind to anyone on Friday, but I was kind on Sunday.

Zoe Weil
Author of Above All, Be Kind and Most Good, Least Harm

Image courtesy of indywriter via Creative Commons.

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Desperate to Do Something Helpful After Flight 250

Posted on October 16, 2009 by zoeweil

In my last blog post I wrote about my experience on United Flight 250 and my reflections upon what was the MOGO thing to do in the tense situation. I received a bunch of great comments on my Facebook page (where this blog is cross-posted), which spurred me to write this addendum.

Perhaps because I knew the MOGO thing was to do nothing during the flight, I think I unconsciously felt a need to do something helpful for someone once we landed. I stopped to use the restroom when we landed, and as I was about to leave I encountered an agitated woman with a 6-month-old baby in a bit of a quandary. She needed to change her baby’s diaper, but the bathroom didn’t have a proper changing table, only a shelf with no safety strap or bumper. With a squirmy child, as hers sometimes was, this is dangerous. So I offered to help. All I did was stand next to her with my body against the shelf to provide a bumper if her baby started rolling and chat as she changed her daughter’s dirty diaper. Then I held her baby so she could wash her hands afterwards. She and I both felt less stressed, albeit for different reasons.

In my book, Most Good, Least Harm, one of the keys to MOGO is to pursue joy through service. My very tiny act of service provided more evidence for the theory that doing good brings happiness. And it was just what I needed after Flight 250.

The moral of this story? Do something kind today.

~ Zoe Weil
Author of Most Good, Least Harm and Above All, Be Kind

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Changing Systems 1: Losing My Cool at the Airport

Posted on February 13, 2009 by zoeweil

I just returned from a 10-day book tour on the West Coast. The trip entailed 3 cities, 6 flights, one car rental, one train ride, and many speaking engagements in a variety of settings. I’m not the best traveler, easily stressing at flight delays and lost baggage, and because I need a bunch of props for my workshops, I try to make sure that I never check my luggage. It was challenging to fit 10 days worth of clothes and workshop materials into my carry-on bags, but I did it.

On my 3rd flight of the trip, very early in the morning, I walked up to security and there was a woman checking carry on bags to make sure they weren’t too big before letting passengers head into the security line. I’d never encountered such a person at the airport, and when she told me my bag was too big and had to be checked, I argued with her. I told her that I travel a lot and had never had a problem with this bag. When she insisted it was too big, I told her I was going through anyway. Whoops. Now I’d escalated the argument, and she insisted I fit my bag into the sizing unit. It was overstuffed, and Icouldn’t get it to fit in without emptying clothes from it into my smaller carry on. She kept harping on me that it wouldn ’t fit, was too big, and would have to be checked, and I was getting hotter and hotter under the collar. I eventually got it to fit, and turned to her, sarcastically saying, “Happy now?”

As I walked away in a major huff, sweating and heart-racing, I was astounded at myself. How unMOGO was that!? If my workshop participants could see me now, I thought. I sure hadn’t modeled the message I hope to convey through my life, my words, and my actions. Most of the time, I try really hard to make the working lives of people involved in air travel positive. I know from my own experience just how stressful air travel can be. Passengers are herded through security and told to be speedy, but we practically have to strip while remembering that our laptops, toiletries, shoes, jackets and sweaters, and empty water bottles, all have to be placed just so on the conveyor belt. We have to deal with lost bags, canceled flights, being kicked off flights due to overbooking or too much weight (even if we’ve paid full fare for our ticket). And all the personnel dealing with us stressed-out travelers have to endure our anger, anxiety, and frustration. I really, really try to be extra kind to them. Until someone pushes my buttons, and I overreact. Like I did in the San Francisco airport last week.

Why did I lose my cool so easily and so visibly? Although I tend to be someone who reacts quickly to things (negatively and positively), there was something else going on. It was this: the situation and the system. As I’ve written about in previous blog posts, we humans do not act solely according to our values; we are influenced by the situations we’re in and the systems we’re part of. This is revealed most profoundly by the Stanford Prison Experiment, and I had clear evidence for the power of situation and system that morning at the airport. I was in a situation in which I had little power and was at the mercy of a rule-enforcer who was uninterested in anything but exerting that power. I was in a system in which a small, but too high, percentage of bags are lost, and in which people are made to jump over unpleasant hurdles to reach a destination. (Less than a year ago, I endured a full body, no-parts-untouched, “pat down” in the Amsterdam airport.) A value I hold dear – treating people with kindness and respect – disappeared in this situation and system.

What is the moral of this story? Until and unless we change systems, we are unlikely to model the message we want to convey as well as we want to convey it. I’m not trying to excuse my poor behavior, but to remind us that we must work diligently at creatively changing systems so that they work in favor of good modeling and MOGO choicemaking . But next time, I will endeavor with much greater effort to not let the situation and system negatively influence my own behavior.

~ Zoe

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