Turning Around

Last weekend we did something I never imagined we would do. We drove to a conference in New Orleans, and when we checked in with the event organizers and saw the agenda, we decided not to stay. So we drove home two days early. 

Not without enjoying a lovely quiche and coffee shop (The Fourth Wall). Not without going to the famous Carousel Bar – where you sit at a bar that literally moves around the bartenders in a circle at the rate of one rotation every fifteen minutes. And not without going on a New Orleans paddle boat jazz dinner cruise. 

So we tasted some New Orleans. And we gave ourselves some time and money by coming home early. 

We had considered staying at the conference and working through the day of sessions that didn’t interest us. But it seemed like an awfully expensive co-working space. 

If we had flown to New Orleans, we would have made the best of the conference commitment. But because we had driven, and because we had talked about our hopes and intentions on the way to the conference, there was a clear path to disengage and come home. 

Lessons learned from our trip – 

• we really enjoy road trips together, and the drive is often more important than the destination 
• ask – persist in asking – for the agenda of an expensive conference
• knowing what our hopes and intentions were made the decision to come home clear
• talking about what our hopes and intentions were set a path of understanding when we met with the disappointment of the agenda. 
• the side quest adventures matter