I’m about halfway back in the cabin, the middle seat of a 767 that’s laid out in a 2-1-2 configuration. That isn’t really important other than to set the scene which is that there are two aisles on either side of me, and as the plane turns to take off from Denver International Airport, the forward cabin looks less like some kind of passenger transportation and more like a bank of monitors in a control room that’s being blasted into space.
I’m coming back from a work trip, and have rerouted myself totally out of the way (I wasn’t going to, from, or anywhere near Denver) in order to enjoy a better product in the air on the way home. As it happens I’ve also rerouted myself into a 2 hour delay as it’s snowing and they couldn’t get the door closed. This happens.
It was a struggle to figure out how start this project. I put down a marker by writing the “About” page. I couldn’t figure out how to properly begin, until the answer was in front of me.
It all comes back to the map. I always put the map on.
I was playing games on my phone to kill the time before eating what – let’s be honest – was going to be a mediocre meal of “chicken on macaroni and cheese” when I noticed it in front of me.
In what is, by its very design, a disorienting experience – you queue up for ages, then go in a metal tube, then they shut the door and tell you a bunch of rules, then you do most of the rules, then eventually after a wait you bounce around for between 1 and 16 hours and then come out the tube somewhere else – the map is the only thing that can reliably provide anything resembling context. Only at certain times can even a window do that:
This prompts me to look up from my phone. The game isn’t the game. The map is the game. The map has all of the challenges. You can level up by accomplishing things you have never dreamed up (plus a few that you have). You can repeat levels over and over until they become familiar. Maybe you can unlock new areas of the map once you have completed a level that was not quite as intimidating. There’s a lot to this game – it’s a better game.
No matter how “good” you are at the game, and no matter how fearless you think you are, there is always something more. There is always another challenge. That is why we do it. It’s easy to stay home.
Like any game, different people have different methods. Some people quit their jobs and devote everything to it. Some people power through nights and weekends to rack up experiences in short bursts. Some people take a long sabbatical every year or so and totally unplug from whatever their reality is. Some people hate playing the game, feeling it’s a tortuous experience where the journey is worth suffering for the payoff of the destination. I try and find balance between all these things, something I haven’t totally achieved.
The tactics are equally diverse. You could fully plan thoughtfully, you can be fully spontaneous – but any way you do play this game, you have to chase the human element. The nuances that create special moments. The moments that require you to use all your senses. It certainly isn’t about “chicken on macaroni and cheese.” If it is, you’re doing it wrong.
So, that is what we will try to capture here in our way. The plane is touching down at LAX. There’s nowhere to go but up.
