Garret to Tara Cooper of Long Beach, CA, who writes:
Hi Garret
I haven’t given the book away yet (Book #56), but thought I’d get in touch to share a great travel story from a few years back. I don’t know if you’ve flown Southwest, but you get to “pick” your seatmate, which I guess is still about as random as being assigned by the airline. Peter and Ross have perfected the art of sniffling and coughing to try to dissuade anyone from sitting in their row! Anyway, I was travelling alone, and ended up chatting with the guy in the next seat. He said he was a speaking coach, and that he’d won the Toastmaster’s tournament a few years earlier. I’d only recently heard of the competitive side of Toastmasters as Livvy was planning to stay with us before her Vegas competition (just a month or so later). When I told him about her, he said I should give her his contact info and they could get together before the event (even though he was also coaching a few of her competitors!) When I passed the info along she’d actually heard of him (Lance Miller), and she ended up going straight from the airport to his house even before coming to us. Who knows how much his advice (combined with yours) changed the course of her life! It does make me wonder how many opportunities I’ve missed out on by burying my nose in a novel while flying.
Now I’m really looking forward to my next flight where I’ll have a chance to gift someone with your book. I’ll get in touch to let you know how that goes too. Hopefully our paths will cross again soon.
Xoxo
Sept. 30, 2015
Hey Garret—Tara here, with Book 56! I set off for the UK today, and I was just giving up hope of having a meaningful conversation with a fellow traveler (since everyone was buried in phones/tablets) when I boarded a bus for a 2 hour ride, and ended up having a lovely conversation with my seat mate, who is British but living in Shanghai, with a daughter who got a full ride soccer scholarship in the U.S. after she qualified for the Hong Kong National team at the age of 14 etc……. Lots of interesting tidbits I would’ve missed out on if I wasn’t determined to give your book away. So thank you! Hopefully you’ll hear from him once he’s read it or after he passes it on—his name is Lee. Take care, and thanks again! Xo