On the Way Home from SFO, I Felt a Little Sad

On the way home from SFO, I was actually pretty sad.

Author: Koutian Wu; GitHub: ktwu01

I have traveled this route many, many times, and it has become routine. Moving through these airports and train stations, nothing feels new or fun anymore. No excitement, no challenge, and without a challenge it stops being fun. It is just not new to me.

Mo, of course, was really happy, because Mo had never done any of this before. Business class, flying, coming out here to play, all of it was new, a new place in America, interesting and worth exploring together.

The same trip was plain water for me and a fresh cup of coffee for Mo.

I think this might be what happens to people once they are rich. When you already have all these experiences, you find out, oh, so this is what it is like.

At that point, what is left for rich people, the thing they want to do, the thing that can still carry their life’s work, may really only be starting companies, exploring the endless unknown, doing moonshots.

Maybe that is why they do it. Moonshots, going to Mars, starting companies, investing, meeting young people they find interesting, doing useful things. Once material novelty is used up, the only thing that still makes the heart race is something nobody has done before.

So when people lose a goal, lose some of the things they had, we are still human, and we still have a basic need to explore an unlimited future and the things that make us curious. That in itself is part of the value of being human.

Of course you need to have food and shelter sorted first, and then you can go explore more interesting things. But the two are not in conflict. They can happen at the same time, and doing both is clearly better. If you postpone exploring until later, later may never come.

And whatever happens, family still matters a lot. Watching how fresh everything felt to Mo, some of what I had stopped seeing came back into view.

Life is short. Why not put a limited life into the most interesting things?