Due to a glut of bad weather especially in its hub cities of Chicago and Denver, Southwest Airlines has been the talk of the country this week as it cancelled thousands of flights during the holiday season, leaving passengers stranded and not knowing where its crew members were in some cases. Much like the Johnny Depp- Amber Heard case earlier this year (nobody talks about that anymore even it was the No. 1 story for weeks on end), this Southwest fiasco will eventually go away, but for now Southwest has really sullied its reputation and people won't be choosing them for a while. I'm scheduled to fly tomorrow to Chicago as well on Southwest and luckily there were other options on other airlines, who swooped in on Southwest's misfortunes (and mishandling of the situation) and capped their fares so that passengers could switch out of Southwest to them. Reminds me of the weeks after the pandemic when all airlines were issuing refunds and demand completely stopped, but the airlines were jostling with each other to not lose their airport positions (because once you lose those, you lose them forever).....right now it's the opposite problem, too much demand from customer going back to pre-pandemic levels, but not enough supply, or employees to staff those planes.
Nowadays it's easy to cancel and switch out of flights, which reminds me of the times I cancelled and backed out of parties, plan, etc. For whatever reason, whether I was too naive, immature, inconsiderate, inexperienced, or didn't have an older sibling to tell me how to act, I took a lot of invitations for granted in my early adulthood and cancelled on things without really thinking about it (not that I was the most popular person anyway), or I tried to thread the needle and try to go to 2 different parties at the same time and leaving in the middle of one to go to another, which surely drew the ire or at least the gossip of at least one if not 2 hosts. Nowadays, having emerged from the pandemic isolation in a new city, I fully grasp the value of those invitations and wish I could do it over again, in a typical "you don't know what you have until you lose it" scenario. As a kid, you think you have plenty of friends and there will always be time to go back to certain friends.....as an adult you realize it's not always like that. If you miss out on one birthday party or don't invite someone back for something, or act in a weird or standoffish way, or just simply don't click with a group of people, those people are kind of just lost...forever. They're still alive, still the same people with they were before, but the link between 2 parties has been severed, it's like your friendship's been cancelled, and it's pretty hard to pick up the phone and try to get a friend back once it's cancelled.
And it's not like when you cancel a Southwest flight, you can just go on their website for the next trip and see how they're doing then. I think back on so many conversations with people I've lost contact with over the years.....co-workers, friends, people I went to school with, people I used to spend every day of the week with (especially co-workers, the contrast between someone you sit with at work every day and know everything about is so vast compared to not seeing them anymore after the job/ project is finished) and the last interaction I ever had with them: did I know then that would be the last conversation I'd ever had with them? (probably not) Was there something I did to cause our friendship to deteriorate, something I could have done differently? (In some cases, maybe, but in others it's just the natural passage of time and not mutual slipping of communication that's the culprit) And then the harsher truths come to light: If we don't talk anymore, were we ever that great of friends to begin with? Did they even value my friendship enough to try to stay in contact with me? I'm sure these questions aren't exclusive to me, but sometimes I do feel if I was more popular, more fun, or people had more reasons to hang out with me, get something out of the friendship with me.....I'd have more friends, and not get the "cancelled" button.
No comments:
Post a Comment