Returning to Reality

Last week at this time, I was attending a conference in La Quinta, California. The resort was one of the most beautiful sights I have seen recently. It was an oasis of green, with putting green lawns, hanging citrus fruit and tall palm trees with a backdrop of volcanic rock punched up into mountain ridges. The Spanish mission architecture gave an exotic feeling of another place and time. At night, the air was cool and crisp, flavored by the smell of wood fires. Colorful lights adorned an impossibly big Christmas tree in front of the main building. It made for a festive, almost fantastic atmosphere.

Flying out, the plane passed over another golf resort. The green of the course contrasted with the brown of the surrounding desert, a reminder that the resort was real, but not reality, a man-made thing of beauty surrounded by the harsher natural landscape. Thus, I left the artificial world of my conference to return to the reality of my everyday life. However, unlike the barren desert surrounding the resort, my reality included returning to home, hugs from family and my own bed.