Flying Again

Manonaplane is on a plane, again. This blog or train of thought, or dribble, depending on your point of view or mine, originated in all the flying I do with the flight time being at least a few minutes of solitary thought. A period of time,  which we rarely find in our busy daily lives of work, children or partners, and other commitments which serve a true and necessary function. So I sit here again thinking, overthinking, as much as my limited intellect will allow.
I am thinking about my day, my week, my year - my life. The things I like and love. The things I could do without but have to carry like a briefcase, which has a lot of what I need but an equal amount of what I don't necessarily want. A phone, a notebook, a schedule and itinerary, as well as a prospectus (not necessarily a document for a deal or company but often for the commitments of my life). Commitments which are often added like buttons to a blazer - some functional  but some just for show: nice to be seen and on the odd occasion talked about. On a plane there are no blazers or buttons. There is the anonymity of being 2d or 24c, chattel to a destination. And it is in this, one can get lost in the depths  (or shallow, baby pool) of one's own thoughts.  
Sometimes the flights carry me home. Sometimes they carry me away for work. Sometimes they carry me to a destination that brings peace, relaxation and an unwind which a tired body and mind need. Sometimes they just carry me away from a life, which even in it's high notes, also find it's own discord and grind. I guess if life were easy, we would all carry ourselves upright in the confidence that all was always well and our impact on the world was true and beneficial and meaningful. Whatever the case, while I am on a plane, I can forget my place in anything other than 2d.
Often as I sit here cradled in some ergonomic excuse for a transcontinental armchair, I wonder what could be, or could have been. I am "old school", which came up in a conversationally this past weekend. A friend was not sure I was truly "old school". My rowdy, and not wholly civil behavior, might have influenced this observation at that point in time. But as those 3 or 4 of you who actually read this blog or my daily column know, I place a premium on things that it seems many people in today's world have forgotten. It does not make me the perfect ambassador of those values all the time. Let's be honest, at the root of our individual existence we are in the end, human, and imperfect. Some of us struggle harder to try to maintain that armor of civility and manner but even the best armor has it flaws and chinks. I try to be that chevalier of old. Sometimes I try too hard, fail and regret.
"Please's" and "Thank You's" do not always suffice. Holding a door or a chair, walking on the outside on a sidewalk, taking an arm, shaking hands, looking someone in the eye, "Mister, Miss, Sir or Ma'am", they get you part the way, but not always there. Sometimes no matter how well intentioned, they let you down as you try to be the person you want to be, not just for others but for yourself. You try, but let's be honest, this is not the world of our grandparents or great grand parents (which had it's own flaws). Chivalry is a foreign concept to most. Civility, something I often lack in my writings, too, trades at a costly premium. People treat each other with an inherent selfishness that belies a true desire to be a good neighbor, friend and citizen, which I think does lie within the hardened wrapper we have taken to protect ourselves from the constant bombardment of today's world. Yes, people are inherently good: some have just strayed further from the path than others.
I was once paid what today I still count as one of the greatest compliments of my life by a trader I was working with at the time, and who I like and respect (and find others do, as he is one of the most like-able and generous people I know). He described me to someone else, as the most polite salesman, and person, he had ever worked with. Maybe he has a limited roster of friends and colleagues from which to compare. I'd like to think, in a business which requires a certain amount of aggressiveness and motivation, that I have managed to find that balance that does not force me to sacrifice that which I hold most dear: my belief that not matter how I may suffer the occasional mis-step or lapse, I remain a gentleman, "old school, a friend to my friends and a person who people want to be around and have around in their lives.
As I fly I often get lost in the introspective. How do I improve? Do better? Be better? How do I take the example set laid out for me like a uniform on a bed, pressed and crisp, prepared for life and ceremony, and make it fit my frame? Can I march in that army, lead the charge, and will anyone follow? My children? My friends, who teach me more than I will ever teach them? Does it matter to anyone else?
I hope the world below, as I fly at 40,000 feet, will one day find a rhythm that finds us all able to appreciate each other. I am a realist though, in all my idealism. I remember that I am imperfect and for the moment only 2d.