YOUR bag is packed, you’re ready to go. If life imitated long-ago popular songs, your next step would be to leave on a jet plane.
But something’s pulling you back. Instead of heading for the airport, you go to the kitchen to be sure you’ve unplugged the coffeepot. You call your mother-in-law to check on the kids, whom you just deposited at her house. You wonder whether it’s really the right time to be away from the office. You sneeze and worry that you’re coming down with the worst cold you’ve had in a decade. Now that surely would be reason to cancel.