Dallas Diaries: Entry One

As I sit in my hotel room in Dallas, Texas, on the first night of my 12 night business trip, it is hard to wrap my around what is going on. Being this is my first business-related trip, I must admit that this is completely out of my comfort zone. To most people, this may seem exciting and come off as an opportunity for a new adventure, but I am still in limbo to how I feel about it. I guess that I will have a more accurate depiction of it when it is all said and done, but right now, I feel like I am in midst of a giant car crash, slowly living out the flipping of a car, buckled in only to observe every excruciating detail as they come along praying for it to hastily pass by. I am trapped in a single moment. The most frustrating thing about it is that I don't know how to make it happen faster.

Some would take advantage of said opportunity to explore a city they have never been in before, but the only thing that interests me is going home. Several of my coworkers have, by day two, gone out and supported another coworker as he performed jazz at a low-key club. Instead, I stayed inside of my hotel room studying. I came here for a reason: to take this training course and pass the test that proceeded it. This trip is about one thing for me: Dollar, dollar bills, y'all. (Dear god, I feel that Texas has begun rubbing off on me!) I am not here to make friends, nor am I here to live out some wild fantasy. I am here on account of my company, which I pledged to represent in the utmost honor. I am here for the bigger picture and the dream of getting where I want to be. I am not the 21 year former version of myself anymore; I take pride in bettering myself and supporting the livelihood of myself and my girlfriend and eventually making our dreams come true. At the end of the day, that is what is most important to me. I want to do comedy, and although these experiences fuel the writing machine, they are minor steps for me to get where I want to be: Los Angeles, California.

Hours prior to my departure, I spent the morning with Audrey and decided not to smoke. I felt proud. I felt mature. As we were enjoying each other's company, we were delaying the inevitable. I was going to leave for 12 days (this is the longest [by far] that I have spent away from her in our 3 years together). We watched several episodes of "The New Normal" on Hulu Plus and laughed our hollow laughter, as we both could tell that we were dreading what was to come. Ironically, I felt (at the time) that the hardest thing was to be the stick in mud who had to ruin the party to say, "Well, I think we should get going." After a silent car ride, we came to a stop at the departure curb at Sky Harbor International Airport, Terminal 3. That, I was to find, was the most difficult part of this entire experience. We both sat facing forward, fighting the reality of the situation, hoping that if no one said anything it didn't have to happen. Being the asshole who got us in this situation, I fought the tears and could only force out a single word before tearing up.

As we said our resilient goodbyes, I turned towards the check-in counter a mess. Fortunately for me, a wonderful representative from American Airlines guided me towards an automatic teller. With my mind still a whirlwind, she was able to look past my reddened eyes and help me towards my ultimate destination. My words, uncomprehending, but that was no challenge for this war-hardened employee who may have thought I was just a little bitch (pronounced: Little Beeeeeyitch). I think our conversation went as so:

Her: "Hello, sir! How may I help you today?"
Me: "I, uhh, have a business thing, that I... uhh, (my company name), I have to go to Dallas for this thing."
Her: "Okay, not a problem, sir. Do you have a credit or debit card with your name on it?"
Me: "25 years old."
Her: (staring at me, understandably bewildered) "I didn't ask you how old you were."
Me: "Oh! What?! I thought you asked me how old I was./Haha!"
Her: "No, sir. I did not. Now, do you have a credit/debit card that I can find your ticket with?"

As I handed her my card, she took care of the rest, including my bag that I needed to have checked in. I proceeded towards my gate after that, but the following details are for another post. I need to sleep so that I can make my training class tomorrow.

Until then...