Jet Lag

One very minor upside to the social distancing quarantines we've been under for two weeks now:  I can find time to start writing again.

Week three of social isolation is underway, a long enough time that I can start to draw some conclusions about my "old" life.  I already wonder if I will ever go back to a daily driving commute--this walk up the stairs after breakfast is a lot less stressful than a typical Atlanta rush hour, and my productivity certainly hasn't dropped and might even be higher.  Most of my work days are spent on the phone and computer anyway, and my department is spread across the country, so it should have been predictable that remote working isn't that much different from office working for me.  (I'm lucky that my kids are old enough to be self sufficient at their home schooling, and that I have a wife who doesn't work outside the home and keeps the household running flawlessly.)

On the unpredictable side, I have been most surprised to find that I'm sleeping each night much better than I was before the lockdown.  Not more, necessarily, but better, deeper, more restorative sleep.  I have changed nothing else in my diet or routine to deliberately chase sleep; I would have though I was sleeping soundly before.  But the difference is enough to be noticeable, and I've been reflecting on why this could be.  The best idea I've had is that it corresponds to the sudden shutdown of my usual peripatetic travel schedule.  Is it possible I had been living in a steady state of jet lag?

I was not regularly jet-lagged in the traditional sense of my body clock being off by a few time zones.  Most of my business travel takes place in my home EST time zone or the neighboring CST that is one hour behind.  But what my travel lacked in distance was perhaps made up for in frequency:  according to Delta, I flew 83 flight segments in 2019, which is over 40 round trips.  Thanks to the fact that my home airport, ATL, is the busiest in the world with direct flights to dozens of cities, I am fortunate to frequently be able to make day trips for meetings.  Sometimes I might have two days like that in a week; occasionally they will be back-to-back so that I get home late one evening then get up early the next morning and head straight back to the airport.  Sometimes the return flights are late, so that I get to bed an hour or two later than normal.  In between trips, there are regular work days and kids activities and social outings, etc.  Many of us know what this business (or "busy-ness") looks like--and many have it worse than I do.

For three weeks now, all of this has come to a sudden and complete halt.  No rushing around, no extra  activities, no flights.  Instead, our family has settled into a fairly steady routine, with fairly regular meal times, a little outdoor exercise each day, and to bed at about the same time every night.  Some of what we've lost in outside socializing we are making up with family time together, playing games and watching movies.  And presto, I'm sleeping more deeply than I have in years.

My conclusion:  I was jet lagged--not so much by actual jet travel, but by the incessant activity that seems to be the steady state operating model for most American professionals and their families.  I wasn't always crossing time zones, but I was compressing and shifting my perception of time through constant motion of mind and body.  Now, without all that rushing around, my mind has finally caught up with my body, I'm sleeping better, and I feel great.

So here's what I'm contemplating as I sit at home:  in two weeks or two months or whenever the social distancing protocols begin to relax and "normal" life begins to restart, how far back to the old ways will I allow myself to get?  I can't, and don't want to, stay sequestered at home forever--monasticism is not for me, and I'm too young to retire.  But is there a point somewhere between sheltering in place and the restless rush of relentless motion that would find me contributing fully to my job, home, and community, while still allowing me to sleep very well at night?  I wonder.

How to Kill an Afternoon in Atlanta

I live in metro Atlanta, a region that is a crossroads rather than a destination for most business travelers, who pass through Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport on their way to somewhere else. But what if Atlanta is your final destination? This brief guide will give the business traveler to Atlanta a few ideas to make the most of her time between meetings.

• Even without your kids in tow, the Georgia Aquarium is worth a visit downtown. The main tank in the world's largest aquarium holds over 6 million gallons of water behind the second largest window the world, offering stunning views of the whale sharks, rays, grouper, and thousands of other fish; you can feel as if you are standing on the bottom of the ocean. Half an hour in front of the window watching the fish glide by is a remarkable way to relax after a stressful morning meeting.
• If you are more a plant person than an animal person, the Atlanta Botanical Garden in Midtown offers a variety of exhibits both indoors and out, including a nice collection of orchids, and is compact enough to get through in a couple of hours. The new canopy walk through the treetops is proving popular, too. Best of all, the garden is located adjacent to Piedmont Park, the finest public space in Atlanta, and a pleasant place to stroll or jog if you are here in the temperate months (late September through May).
  
• At the High Museum of Art in Midtown, the highlight may be the buildings themselves, a 1983 Richard Meier classic which was further improved by a Renzo Piano-designed expansion that opened in 2005. Check to see if one of the regular blockbuster exhibitions is on while you are here; if not, the best part of the permanent collection is the top floor of the new Wieland Pavilion, where natural light filters through a specially-designed high ceiling onto a part of the Contemporary art collection. If you don't believe that architecture can affect your perceptions and mood, visit this space.
  
• For the quintessential Atlanta shopping experience, head to Lenox Mall in Buckhead. Built in the late 1950s as an outdoor shopping center, expanded and covered since then, it has been THE place to shop in Atlanta since it opened. Housing both everyman department stores and luxury boutiques, this is the place to see metro Atlanta's mix of society matrons, hip-hop urbanites, modernist hipsters, and suburban families, all in one place.
• Atlanta is a great restaurant town, but if I had to pick just one place to recommend to a traveler staying in the downtown convention district, I would recommend French American Brasserie on Ivan Allen Jr Blvd. Walkable from all the convention hotels, FAB offers excellent French comfort food, Parisian-inspired decor, friendly service, and a cool rooftop bar that is an ideal place for an aperitif. Your clients will be impressed that you know about this place.
  

Long Day

Here at Present Tense Living, our philosophy is to make the most of every day, to enjoy life in the here and now. I've recently returned from Alaska, where long summer days open open up an entirely different perspective on "make the most of today."

While all of us in the lower 48 enjoy the longer summer evenings, in Alaska summer is a totally different experience. One evening I did my bedtime reading by the light streaming through my window at 11 pm--the trees were still bathed in the orange glow of the setting sun. Still adjusting to the four-hour time change, I awoke the first morning at 4 am--to bright sunshine forcing its way into the room around the blackout curtains. With 20+ hours of daylight, in Alaska one can pack two days worth of activities into each day--talk about "making the most of today"!

June 21 marks the summer solstice, the day with the most daylight in the Northern Hemisphere. I checked the stats for Fairbanks today: sunrise at 2:58a, sunset at 12:48a. I now know the answer to that hypothetical question: "What would you do if you only had one day to live?" Answer: Go to Fairbanks on a June day--the day never ends.

The payback comes, of course, in December, when I am told the night seems to never end. But for a few weeks in the summer, our friends in Alaska can do more in a day than any of us dare even attempt.

Wherever you find yourself on this longest of days, spare a moment to take notice of and appreciate the sights, sounds, and people around you. This is the day the Lord has made--let us rejoice and be glad in it!