After two red-eye flights and a very long day (and night) of travel, I finally arrived at my hotel somewhere around 2am, 5am to my body.

I staggered up to the counter with my heavy travel cases and said,

“Good evening. Brian Miller, checking in.”

The two folks behind the counter were very pleasant, asking about my flights, why I was in town, etc. I mentioned I would be getting up in just a few hours to pick up a rental car in the morning, and would be lucky to get any sleep at all.

They were kind and sympathetic, swiftly taking care of all the paperwork and handing me the keys:

“You’ll be in room 104. Have an excellent night, sir.”

I turned my head to figure out if I needed to turn right or left down the first floor hallway. But there, right in front of me, four feet away and immediately adjacent to the check-out counter, was Room 104.

Let’s be honest, I wasn’t thrilled.

You’re kidding me, I thought. I just checked in at 2am, you know I’m worried about not getting any sleep, and you put me right next to the counter, where I’ll get woken up by all the morning traffic of people checking out?!

“Oh,” I started. 

Fighting the urge to act aggravated, I summoned all my remaining strength, then quietly and calmly asked,

“Do you have anything that isn’t right next to the counter? This area is awfully loud in the morning, and I really do need to get some sleep.”

The hotel manager’s eyes widened.

“I’m so sorry!” he exclaimed, genuinely apologetic. “I intentionally put you in this room because I thought you’d be so tired when you got in, this way you could just get right into the room!”

Different Perspectives

Even in my sleep-deprived state, I had to smile.

It was a brilliant lesson in perspectives. Here I couldn’t imagine why any hotel manager would be so thoughtless to put someone in my position in the noisiest room, while the manager went out of his way to reserve the room for me with the shortest distance between check-in and sleeping.

Next time you don’t understand someone’s actions, don’t assume their motives. Ask. Good intentions are usually just out of our reach.

I thanked him profusely for his thoughtfulness. He moved me to a room at the end of the hall.

And I slept like a baby.