My return from visiting my grandson took much longer than anticipated. After arriving at the airport at 2:30 pm yesterday for my 4:40pm flight, the flight kept getting delayed and delayed until finally they cancelled it, after I had been at the airport for seven hours. Fortunately, they were able to book me on a flight early the next day and they gave me hotel accommodation for the night. But staying in a strange hotel room knowing that one must get up early usually results in poor sleep and that was the case with me. But then the next day, after arriving at the airport at 6:30 am, that flight was delayed another three hours so I came home pretty exhausted and crashed for a few hours.

But now I feel refreshed.

One thing I have noticed is that long delays and cancellations makes people at the airport much more sociable, with mutual tales of woe being a good conversation starter. I had enjoyable chats with many people who happened to be either sitting next to me or when we were standing in line to reschedule our flights, which confirms my view that people are in general nice and we miss out by not interacting more. I had a particularly long chat with a couple who, when they found out I was a physicist, asked me a ton of questions about physics involving dark matter and energy and cosmology in general. I essentially conducted an hour long tutorial.

Why is it that it seems like it is only adversity and problems that break down the barriers between people?