- Andrew Stevens

On the Go

       I met her between McDonald’s and a pizza place at O’Hare airport. She, out of hundreds of others, caught my eye.  Her name was Heidi Gailey, and I was hoping it would be a normal interview, but I knew everyone had a story to tell.  After a little while, I knew hers.
         Heidi was in Chicago because of work, but it wasn’t her first job.  She’s also been a banker, a lifeguard, a motivational speaker, and she’s been in an employee relations program.  Being a lifeguard, she told me, you have to be “physically fit, you have to pass a test, and you have to keep up on your CPR.” 
Being a lifeguard has helped her throughout her life. She once saved her daughter from choking with the help of her lifeguard training.  I wondered about the employee relations job, and she told me that they handle insurance benefits for workers, and they can lay off or hire people.  The reason she’s had all these jobs is because she likes to “try different things.”
         Heidi is not only sporadic about her jobs, but travel as well. She’s been to Canada, Honduras, Belize, Mexico (four times!), and even Alaska.  In Alaska, she took an inland Alaskan cruise through Juneau and Sitka.  She even took a helicopter ride over a glacier, which she said, “was cool.”  She has also walked on a glacier! But her story doesn’t stop there.
         In Mexico, Heidi scuba dived, and she saw amazing sights.  She saw stingrays, eels, turtles, brightly colored tropical fish, and brain and fan coral formations of different shapes and sizes. Heidi has also visited the Aztec ruins.  In Honduras, she went to an iguana farm.  Who heard of such a thing?  A normal sized iguana, Heidi told me, got to two feet long.  The ones at the farm were six feet!
         But what is special are not the places she visits, but what she does at each place.  Heidi goes to the historical sites of wherever she’s visiting to learn more about it.  In Virginia, she went to the Jamestown Civil War ruins, as well as Williamsburg.  In Mexico and Belize, Heidi went to the Aztec and Chitzanitza (Mayan) ruins that were there.  Heidi hopes to visit England, Scotland, Ireland, and Wales because that’s where her ancestors came from.
         Unfortunately, our conversation was cut short because Heidi had to board her flight back to Seattle, where she lives.  I wished it wouldn’t end, because I had more questions to ask. However I was glad to have heard part of her amazing story.