Some notes from my recent trip to Windsor in the UK, where I was speaking at a financial planning conference:
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The first day of the conference concluded with a formal, British black-tie dinner, including a cocktail hour in the chapel where the Magna Carta was signed.
I didn’t know about this dinner and didn’t have the required tuxedo, so I politely declined the invitation. But my hosts insisted I attend, so amid about 400 people in tuxedos and formal gowns was me, wearing jeans, a T-shirt, and a jacket.
I stuck out like a sore thumb. It was perfect.
Also, it didn’t matter. No one cared what I was wearing, and if they did, they were monstrous, awful souls. I had a terrific time at dinner talking to people whom I genuinely adored.
Besides, isn’t it weird to tell adults what to wear? I thought that nonsense ended for us in childhood.
For me, it did.
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The dinner also featured two singing waiters who began their show by faking a fall in the middle of the dance floor. I thought the fall was real, and when the waiter didn’t initially move, I began to move, already preparing to tell someone to call 911 while I ran through the steps to assess an injured person and perhaps begin CPR and request an AED.
Years of Boy Scout training and yearly CPR training kicked in instantly.
Then the waiter leaped off the floor and began singing.
I liked the singing waiters a lot, but I didn’t like the way they began their performance.
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I set off the hotel’s fire alarm at 7:00 AM.
The bathroom door has a sign that reads, “Please close door when showering.” I thought it was because the shower isn’t a shower but simply a shower head over a drain on the bathroom floor.
No tub.
No raised area to contain the water.
Just a curtain that hangs from the ceiling to my knees.
When you take a shower, the whole bathroom showers with you.
Sometimes we try too hard to be different, and we fail. This shower is a perfect example.
I opened the door after my shower, and the steam exited the bathroom, hit the smoke detector, and set it off. Hotel personnel arrived about 10 minutes after the alarm had gone off and finally quit, checking to see if I was alive.
“Did you close the door when you showered?” the man asked.
“Yes,” I said. “Then I opened it when I stepped out to get dressed.”
“Do you take a very hot shower?” he asked.
“Yes, I do.”
“Well,” he said. “There you go. The steam set off the alarm on the other side of the room.”
“Is there a sign warning me to avoid especially hot showers?” I asked.
“No.”
“But this has apparently happened before?” I asked.
“Yes.”
Then he left.
This makes no sense to me.
I’m terrified about my next shower.
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There’s a Galaga arcade game in the hotel. Four people from the conference have challenged me to a game so far, and I destroyed all four. All of them attributed their loss to me being an American.
I attributed it to them being British.
Truthfully, I grew up in the 1980s, when every video game cost a quarter to play, so getting good at a game was essential to extend your fun.
I got very good at video games as a kid. Apparently it stuck.
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I’ve met a lot of people over the last three days in Windsor, and I genuinely like quite a few of them, and a couple in particular. What I’ve come to realize about connecting quickly to people at events like this is this:
If the person and I are genuinely fascinated by each other, we will likely like each other a lot.
In each case, the person I came to like a lot expressed genuine curiosity about me as a person, and I expressed a similar interest in them. When a dynamic like this happens, I can’t spend too much time with someone. The conversation is endlessly fascinating.
A lot of it comes down to asking great questions, being willing to be vulnerable, and sharing parts of your life beyond just work and family.
I can specifically remember a handful of people I’ve met this year who made me feel this way, and I hope to cross paths with each of them again.
It’s a good lesson in making strong connections with people:
Be interested in their life, and hope they will feel the same. If so, you’ve likely found a new friend.
