Thursday, September 9, 2010

When I ascend to 20,000 feet on Sunday–not by sorcery, nor good works, nor psychotropic drugs, but by aeroplane–I will not be alone. I will have my tote and laptop with me, to be sure, and there will be precisely 89 other passengers, based on the model of aircraft and ticket sellout, but I’m not referring to any of these things. Instead, I’m talking about the conviction I carry with me–the belief that this trip will be a chance to grow professionally and, perhaps, witness firsthand what people normally do.

Now, I don’t know if this particular event will be life-changing. Certainly I’ve heard good things about it. I imagine every conference would like to believe in its transformative power. But this gathering isn’t a Billy Graham revival, and neither is it a Jim Jones Kool-Aid tasting. It will be four days of keynote speakers, workshops, and expo halls, so whether its lasting effect will extend beyond the week remains to be seen. For me, the value lies, as always, in skill acquisition. In this case, it’s a question of increasing my capacity for business trips. There will be an entire week of interaction. Will I have the wherewithal to engage, convincingly so, for an extended period of time?

I’ll tell you where I’ll be disengaging for an extended period of time. Here. We’re going dark all next week. To make up for this, I’ll share the most useful conversational topics I discover in the coming days. For now, though, I need to shop for a sports coat. I see two immediate benefits conferred by this article of clothing. First, it offers sleeves, something which my usual shirts lack. More importantly, when you pair a jacket with a firm handshake and a business card, nothing quite says, “Pleased to meet you. We’ll probably never speak to each other again.”