Wandering Into Adventure

I'm in Phoenix, and I was completely lost today. There was a perfect storm of things that occurred to get me lost in a city that I have never been, but it happened. I don't like being lost, but there are times when it doesn't bother me. It wasn't as if I didn't have any water, or I was due to be somewhere, so I took it as an adventure.

There I was walking on Camelback Road in the middle of a residential neighborhood looking for a baseball stadium that was 100 blocks away. In the process though, I pulled an orange off of an orange tree along the road and ate it. I admired the beautiful grass that some people have in their yards. I thought about how great the warmth of the sun was, and how great it was to walk without pain after the marathon.

I think that many of our moments at school as principals could fit into this metaphor. Each day we wander off into a place of uncertainty, where we don't know the way, and it can be fun, exciting, and even a place for growth. Tomorrow will be more routine. We will do our presentation, go to a few sessions, and finish the day with friends, but when the memories are all sewn up for the weekend, it may be today that we remember because failure breeds memories, and failure breeds learning.

I hope that you have an opportunity to just go and wander into something unplanned, and I hope that it doesn't go perfect, so that an adventure will be made for you to remember.