Having stepped out of the flight at Tampa, I was weaving thru all those folks at the gate waiting to get into the plane for the outbound flight, when I thought I saw somebody that looked very much like me. Clearly somebody of Indian origin, he was also bespectacled and sported a clean shaven head.

What is more, I thought I might actually know him. He was peering into his iPhone busy doing whatever it is that busy people do with their iPhones at airports. To make sure I was not mistaking a stranger for somebody I knew, I went and just stood next to him. Eventually, he lifted his head and sure enough – it was an old colleague from the past – Gautam Vyas!

Neither of us work in our old company any more – so it gave me a chance to catch up with his exciting moves in career as well as get updates on some of the old colleagues. Funny part is that we do not live that far apart from each other (by Atlanta standards at least) but we actually saw each other first time after I left that job in of all places – Tampa airport!!

The normal routine after checking into my hotel room at 9PM any day would be to fish out my laptop or iPad out, go downstairs, get a seat and a drink and finish up some of the office emails. Last Monday, I checked into the Courtyard in Waukegan, went to my room and suddenly told myself – “Break up the routine”.

But how? Maybe not take any digital device with me? Well, I had to keep the phone in my pocket in case of emergency calls from home or family. But not before I had quickly glanced for any urgent emails. There being none, I slipped it in to my pocket and went to the bar.

The idea was to grab a drink and then just sit at an empty table. And just watch what goes on. That hurried guest who would stroll in and check in to the hotel. Those folks at the table making the last minute changes to their sales presentation. And all that.

Well, that was the plan.

In reality, what happened was in about five minutes, I was sitting at the empty bar surrounded by four staff members of the hotel. And it was like I was holding court there. Asked everybody about their origins and life in general. There was the lady who had lived most of her life in the locality and was making small packets with chocolates for her guests for the next day (it was Valentine’s day next day). There was the gentleman from Mexico who missed his parents.

But this story is about the 20 year old young gentleman who not only stood there and talked to me… he eventually came back to me to talk to me more when everybody had left.

“I have a daughter nearly your age”, I tried to make a connection with him.
“She is in college?”
“Yes”
“Where”
“NYU”
“Wow! She is fortunate”

Not sure how to take this forward, I tried a different tack…
“What do you want to be when you grow up?”
“Law Enforcement, Sir!”
That took me a few seconds to absorb. I cannot remember any young kid ever having said that to me before.
“Local, State or Federal?”, I fished.
“Local and then Federal”
“Why Law Enforcement?”, I asked.

That is when I started to put this young man’s story together. His grandfather was in the Navy. As was his dad. At some level, it is in his DNA to be in a similar line. But what is not DNA – just him – is his sheer drive and single mindedness.

He is in his second year in Community College. But he spends an enormous amount of time in community activities. He evens pays thru his college by working with different local enforcement agencies – sometimes doing as mundane jobs as writing reports and sometimes patrolling the beaches. (BTW, he gave me the tips to find the beach to run on the next day).

The more I talked to him, the more I was impressed in his clarity of what he wanted in life. At that age, if you had asked me the same question, you could not have gotten a blanker stare. I was totally taken in by his enthusiasm of his beliefs in how people are usually great and by organizing them into communities you can do what cannot be individually achieved.

About half an hour later, I had to ask him “So, what is your name?”
“Justice, Sir”.
“Justice?”
“Justice Morgan”
I could not help. “Justice wanting to be in Law Enforcement. The jokes just roll off the tongue, don’t they?”
“You cannot even imagine, Sir”.

Maybe not. But here is something I can imagine, Justice. With a young guy as driven and as focused as you, I cannot think of a single force that is big enough to stop you. Your world, as you desire, shall be yours.

Certainly, as somebody more than thirty years older to you, I want to believe that – that is the world we built and left for you.

Now, make it so!!

Remember how I went to see Lavern at Phoenix – missed her – but landed up meeting Mikey after so many years? A somewhat similar thing happened again before I wrapped up my business trip last week.

The last meeting for the last day was over around 5PM. Dinner with office folks were set around 7PM. I had 2 hours. Of course, the first instinct was to check out another Gin distillery. The one that I had my mind on was Aviation. It is one of the original gin distilleries in Portland and is a pioneer of what is called American style gin. This style is lower on the juniper side and higher on the citrus front.

Google maps said they were open till 6 PM. Managed to convince Anand to drive us there. We probably reached around 5:20 or so. And they were closed!! With a big “Private Party” sign on it! I could see that there was nobody inside but there was no way to go in.

Totally disheartened, I was wondering what to do. I still had time. Anand suggested that we check out some other distillery. Instead, I suddenly remembered something. I asked him – “Isn’t the Doubletree nearby here?”. He confirmed that it was. (He has moved to Portland a few months back). “Let’s go. I will introduce you to a friend there”.

And that friend is somebody I had met about three years back. Joel was the bartender at The Den in the Marriott downtown hotel. One lonely evening when virtually no one was there, we got to know each other. I wrote up about him back in 2014. I still remember he teaching me a few new cocktails and I winning the contest of who could name the strangest vodka. (I said Sriracha vodka. Yes, there exists such a thing).

Presently, both Anand and I walked up into the Doubletree bar which was extremely crowded but we managed to get near the bar. The barman looked at us and asked “How can I help you?”. And the next thing he said was “Hey, it is you”!! He recognized me in one shot.

He even managed to get us two empty chairs at the bar. In between all the running around he was doing, we managed to catch up on each others’ lives. I had gotten to know his story about early childhood before. Now I found out that he has gotten married a few months back and more excitedly, is looking forward to his first European trip ever in a few more weeks.

I told him about my research on gins. In the meanwhile, he had my favorite evening drink made for me and Anand – an Old Fashioned. He taught me a different way of making it that he had learnt from two famous bartenders. Basically, you do not muddle the orange peel or the cherry – you just add them as garnish. The syrup and bittesr were in perfect proportions. Anand declared that it was the best old fashioned he ever had. It was certainly one of the best I have had.

In the end, he was getting busy and I had a dinner to go to. Joel lined up all the gin bottles he had to mark my research on gins and then Anand took a picture of both of us!!

That was a great time had meeting a person I had accidentally met and made friends with three years back. This meeting was far more deliberate (although luck was involved) and renewed our friendship!!

There are few things that qualify as being more “American” than being a new house owner. With a mighty mortgage interest to pay, I might add. It was barely five minutes that I had walked into my first house in Texas than when an elderly lady (turned out later I found out she was my dad’s age) came to introduce herself. That was my first meeting with our the-then-neighbor Lavern. Later, we got to know her daughter Melanye who was my age and Sharmila and Melanye had kids almost at the same time and we just became great neighbors. Lavern bought a Maltese dog. Natasha got so attached to it that eventually we had to get our own Maltese.

Unfortunately, life has a way to tear you apart. First, we left Dallas. But I kept up with Lavern. Never missed going by our house when business would take me to Dallas. Never missed talking to her on her birthday.

Then the walk thru the darkness started. She called me up one day to let me know that Melanye had met an untimely death. Frankly, I still block myself off from that and have not processed it totally. Jim – Lavern’s husband, had taken a turn for the worse. They moved to Phoenix. Then he passed away. She made me promise to her that I will visit her when I come to Phoenix.

The phone calls continued. And then one fine December 2nd, the call said that the number was not valid no more. No problem, I said… she has new numbers. So, I sent her an email. I know by rote her email id. I had helped her set up the AOL account. Mail bounced back!! I was helpless. I had no ability now to reach out to Lavern. In USA!!! I tried a few usual tricks – checked Facebook etc for her or her other daughter (I got to know her too). No luck!

For about three years, I continued to search the internet for property records and white pages to look for her. I had narrowed it down to one address but no phone number. And three years later, I was in Phoenix airport to drive to Tucson this week.  I had my math worked out. I would dash to the address – surprise her and in 45 minutes start screaming down I-10 for the Board member meeting in Tucson.

Except that she did not live in that address!! However – and there is a long story about who I met there – I will write about it later – but, I did find Lavern’s new address and that was all I needed. Presently, I pulled into a complex that has been built for seniors. After going thru security, my biggest problem was finding the house. I was going around in my car all over looking for house number 322. Stopped three people in the complex. Very old folks. But very helpful folks. Nevertheless, of no help to me since they did not know or remember how the numbering scheme worked in their place. One even had to yell at her husband to remind her what their own house number was. [Some day, I want to sit with that couple – you know – just to spend a little time with them]

In my frustration, I was going from street to street and one point, in my desperation, I backed out so hard, the wheel of my rental car hit something. I came out to check the damage. Fortunately, it was only the tires and rim that were scraped. Thanking my luck, I came back and sat down in the car. Looked up – and there it was – house #322. Hallelujah!!! Heaven knows, I needed that break!

Parked the car – not so legally, I think – there and ran in thru the gate.

Pressed the bell. No response.

“Lavern?”, I yelled. No response.

“Lavern?”, I yelled again hoping to wake her up from her afternoon sleep,

There was a muffled “Yes?”. Somebody was desperately trying to wake up from sleep.

Good news – somebody was there! Bad news – nobody that sounded like Lavern.

Very afraid that I had hit a wall, I bleated out “Lavern, this is Rajib here”.

“Huh”? The voice – a little more coherent – said.

You can imagine me. Here is a brown stranger barging into an Arizona house with a small but finite possibility of getting shot for mistaken identity. I had to quickly establish that I was not a burglar or anything. So, I put my office jacket on that I was carrying in my hand. Like that was going to help me against the bullet 🙂

“Lavern?”, was my next – and completely unthought thru step.

“Huh?”. This time the voice was clearer. And was certainly in the process of waking up.

Wait a minute, Rajib, I said to myself. You know that voice! Wait… Wait…Wait… and then I yelled

“Mikey? Is that you?”

“Yes”.

!!!!!!!

“Mikey, this is Natasha’s dad. Your next door neighbor from Coppell”.

The whole scenario changed!

“REALLY???” was the yell that came out from inside. He recognized me in on shot. A lot of noises inside the house later, out came a sleepy guy in sleeping clothes. And the only think I could recognize was his face.

“I can’t believe you came to see us!!!”, he said.

We hugged each other for what seemed like ages.

Over the next 15 minutes or so, we reconstructed her lives back. Turns out he moved from Texas to join a community college in Phoenix and live with his grandmother. He has plans of going back to Texas (Texas Tech to be precise) soon. Lavern, unfortunately, was at a bible study at that time. I missed her. But I got to see Mikey.

I apologize, I forgot to mention to you – the kids that Sharmila and Melanye had around the same time? – they are Natasha and Mikey. You can see why we were close. Thru the whole time, he kept saying – “I can’t believe you came to see us”. And I was like “I can’t believe I am with you”.

“I have something to show you”, I told him.

“What”?

You see the night before I started my weeklong business trip, I had searched my photo database and saved out a few pictures of Lavern from nearly 20 years back, hoping to show them to her when I met her. For whatever reasons, I found and saved some pictures of Mikey too! And the dog that inspired us to get Princess!!

I showed him the picture!

“That’s me?”, he asked.

“What do you think?”.

He is the guy in the red sweater with that Maltese dog, by the way!!!

I had to take leave soon. Else I would be late. But not before I had taken down Lavern’s new contacts.

An hour into the drive, I got the expected call from Lavern. We talked again like those good old days. And like those good old days, she asked me “Promise me you will come and visit me whenever you are in Phoenix”.

“Lavern, if I could keep my promise the first time after so many years, I certainly can do it the second time. You just keep yourself healthy. I will be back”.

And the countdown started….clocks had been reset….. again….