Small World

I've been doing a lot of traveling in 2011 thus far, and have observed how small the world has gotten. Recently I spent 36 hours on the road, in the air and sitting in airports, and the people that I met were all discussing the same topics from the east coast to the west coast to up north. It was almost like I had never left the same village, in spite of weather differences and visiting with people from other parts or the country and world. My day started with a drive to Pittsburg with my daughter, where I boarded a flight with a young lady from Germany on her way to Atlanta, as her first stop before exploring as much of the United States as she could in the next 6 weeks. Our conversation was similar to the one I just had with my daughter, family, life, work. Atlanta to Denver I sat with a young father on his way home from a business trip. Same conversation, he wasn't into reading his book, but was enjoying the homemade mermaid bookmark that his daughter had made for him, and anxious to see her and his wife soon. Denver to Seattle was an older gentleman, and much the same conversation as we reflected on our lives that had been similar to the young Mother calming her fussy baby down in the row behind us. Then there was the 2 older ladies that met on the plane from Seattle to Anchorage who chattered the entire 4 hour flight like school girls, then exchanged addresses to keep in touch. I thought as my long day was turning into a long week that I ha d covered a lot of miles in a short time and everywhere I went people were doing and thinking very similar thoughts and living very similar lives. Has television, internet and easy travel made the cultures merge into one? My 5 hour drive from Anchorage to Homer, in the dark watching for moose, was a similar finish to my oddessy as the 2 hour drive from Erie to Pittsburg in the dark watching for deer. I could hardly tell I was thousands of miles away from where I started. Small world.