A Week at the Airport (2009) by Alain de Botton

A quick little read which provides a perspective of what it is like to spend a significant amount of time in an airport terminal. Thoughts on the relationships fostered at an airport; the economies that interact with, and exist as a result, in an airport; and the surveillance society we live in are all offered. One particular piece contained within the II Departures section caught my attention:

Our capacity to derive pleasure from aesthetic or material goods seems critically dependent on our first satisfying a more important range of emotional and psychological needs, among them those for understanding, compassion and respect. We cannot enjoy palm trees and azure pools if a relationship to which we are committed has abruptly revealed itself to be suffused with incomprehension and resentment.

This immediately hit home with me.