The starting point is where you are

After a month of June in which I had to spend some part of every week away from home, it’s a relief to have a month of relative calm with minimal travel.

In fact, the first time I’m going to have to take a flight again is only at the beginning of August, when I plan to fly back to England from Spain. So I decided to call up the British Airways app this morning and see about booking the trip.

What amused me is that the default screen came up with the option of flying from Glasgow to Austin (Texas) this very day, flying back tomorrow. Across the Atlantic and half of the United States one day, and back the next? Gracious living that certainly isn’t.

Can we make sure you’re at least taking me
from where I am, to where I want to go?

But I found the selection of route most amusing because I’m nowhere near Glasgow. Indeed, I’m in Spain, not in Scotland at all. As for Austin, it would leave me a lot further from where I need to go than I am now.

Indeed, since I want to get to London, I’d be a lot closer if I stayed in Glasgow than if I went to Austin. If, that is, I were in Glasgow at all. Which I’m not.

In fact, I loved the idea that I would even struggle to get to Glasgow in the first place, in order to catch the flight to Austin. I mean, if I wanted to get to Austin, (which I don’t), why wouldn’t I start from where I am now, rather than travelling somewhere else first?

All of which put me in mind of one of my favourite stories, one I’ve told more than once before right here. It’s the story of the tourist in an Irish village who asks a local if he’s going the right way for Dublin.

“Dublin?” replies the old man, “if I were going to Dublin, I wouldn’t start from here.”

It’s mainly as a metaphor that I like that joke. Every time someone starts a sentence with the words “If only…” I think of it: “If only we’d invested in the product last year…”; “if only we’d taken out insurance sooner…”; “if only we’d reserved a table…”

We are where we are. If we still want to get where we were planning on going, we’re going to have to start from here. An invaluable piece of wisdom which isn’t always immediately obvious to us.

But my experience with BA today suggested that the story’s has its value at the literal level too.

If I’m going to book a flight, I’d rather it took me where I actually wanted to go.

And it would help if it suggested I start from where I actually am.

Just a thought, BA. Maybe a small enhancement to the app?