The Adventure Begins

Put my away message on at 3 pm today and headed home to finish packing and head to the airport. My daughter Jenny, George Linney, and Christopher Gergen were all booked on a Delta flight through Minneapolis. Still in Minneapolis as I write—our 9:15 flight is delayed until 11:30 because the San Antonio Spurs commandeered our plane, scheduled to land at 1:17 am in San Diego, which would be about the time we should get up for a training ride in North Carolina.

We knew we’d be challenged to get our sleep on this trip, but I didn’t expect it to come quite this quickly. But the recompense was sweet: We four teammates had a leisurely dinner toasting our Great Adventure. Who else gets to take a week off from the grind of daily duties and focus on one thing, one hard thing, one all-consuming thing? The chance to try our hands (legs, really) at a truly elite athletic event. And to do so with marvelous comrades.

So here’s to all the folks we’ve left behind, who didn’t get to leave their daily grind, who drove us to the airport, who will follow us online and maybe worry about us. We are the blessed ones, even if our plane got stolen by some basketball team and we’re stuck in the airport half the night. We’ve got nobody to blame but ourselves; those asleep in their beds are doing the really hard work; and none of us would change a thing.