Guilt doesn’t care….

…where you are, or what your excuse is. My mom recently had an accident and broke a couple of ribs – I’m not sure what is wrong with my mom, she doesn’t have osteoporosis, but she definitely has some kind of issue with her bones because every time she falls she breaks something. My mom isn’t exactly petite and she has some issues getting around. She always tells me to be careful snowboarding, riding bikes, wakeboarding, whatever…. And I always want to say “you make it one year without breaking something and you can tell me to be careful.”

I was out of town (still am) in Bozeman and was heading to WY. I know she was in the hospital and in a lot of pain, but there wasn’t anything I could do about it. I felt bad that I couldn’t get by to help out or visit.

The Super Bowl is now over, but you may recall the Visa commercials where the guys are talking about making every Super Bowl. In one commercial in particular one guy is saying how he’s missed weddings, funerals, kids being born, etc. My immediate thought was “what a douchebag.” The guy was bragging because he placed the value of entertainment above his family. Douchebag.

In my case, I had no idea my mom was going to get hurt. Still, I miss out on some things that are important to me because of my work. That’s not to say that work takes precedent over everything else, but we all have to work. Would it really matter that much if I was in town but still couldn’t get away because of my job? After all, a couple of broken ribs is very painful but is not life threatening. The one advantage of being home would be that I could have visited after work.

But, this is my life. This is what I do for a living. I don’t remember ever thinking that I would have a job quite like this – traveling, meeting new people and challenges, etc. It just sort of unfolded that way. So, unlike the douchebag in the Visa commercial I’m not making a conscious decision to not be there when something happens. It’s mostly chance. But even at 30,000ft guilt doesn’t care….