Jess' Journeys // July 28, 2008

Nine years ago today I was in the middle of what is literally one of the longest days of my life so far.

July 27 was the last day for staff at the summer camp I was working at in Maine. We got up around 7, took care of all of the last bits of housekeeping business, got our paychecks, and boarded the bus to the airport in Manchester, New Hampshire. Everything was going fine, and despite the 3 hours of sleep, everyone was in good spirits…until we got to the airport.

We pulled into the airport and unloaded our luggage from the van. Mine consisted of my giant bag, my smaller carry-on bag, and the messenger bag I used as a laptop bag. Of course as soon as I went to get out of the van the strap on my messenger bag broke. My laptop was fine, but there was no space in the other bags to cram it, so I ended up carrying it under my arm for the rest of the adventure.

There were huge storms across the entire eastern side of the country. One of the girls got lucky and her flight was cancelled either right before we got there or right after, so the airline booked a hotel room for her. The rest of our flights just kept getting postponed. To put the timeline in perspective, we got to the airport a little before 2pm. Most of the staff was flying to Florida, and one guy was flying into Atlanta. I was flying to Birmingham with a layover in Philadelphia.

My flight to was supposed to be at 5pm, but by the time I saw the board around 2:30, it was already listed it as leaving somewhere around 7pm. Thus began the waiting.

We hadn’t eaten lunch, so that was the first order of business. Slight issue there. Quiznos was out of bread (they did eventually get some buns from the nearby McDonald’s to use) and wasn’t planning to obtain more. McDonald’s was out of burger patties. Whatever, I don’t care. I ate my mcnuggets, drank my orange Hi-C, and chilled in the McDonald’s seating area with a couple of the other counselors. Then we all went off to sit at our separate gates just in case they cancelled our flights or offered any sort of advice about what to do. I’m really glad we ate when we did. By the end of the night, I was hearing rumors that there was nothing left at the McDonald’s either.

I settled into my chair at the gate and hung out. This was before I had an iPhone and long before all of the really fun cell phone apps. I read my book for a little while, and then I started chatting with the lady sitting next to me. She and a couple of other ladies were on their way to a knitting convention. I had no idea those even existed. Looking back, I really wish I’d asked her to show me how to knit. We became travel buddies for the night.

Finally around 9, our flight gets clearance to board, and off we go to Philadelphia. The airline had assured us that they were holding the flight from Philadelphia to Birmingham because half of that flight was on our plane. The airline also assured my mother that if anything happened and I got stuck in the Philadelphia overnight, they’d be providing a hotel room for her teenage daughter. These were both lies.

We landed in Philadelphia, got off the plane, and watched as the plane we were supposed to be on taxied away from the gate and took off. Off we all go to the little counter to get our flights re-scheduled. Finally around 11 it was my turn at the desk. They told me the next flight to Birmingham was at 4pm the next day. I mention the hotel room, and they tell me all of the rooms are already booked. There’s no sympathy happening here. These people were over it, and I really don’t blame them. The best the girl could do was to get me on a 7am flight to Dallas the next morning which where I would change planes and fly to Birmingham, getting there around 2pm. Fine, whatever.

Here’s the little details she left out. The Philadelphia airport shuts down at night. I mean everything shuts down. There’s no food, the moving sidewalks turn off, and the guys come in to clean/buff the floors. We were in Concourse E. The 7am flight was in Concourse A, and on a different airline. I get my revised ticket, and meet back up with my travel buddy. She’s going to be on a different flight out, but we’re going to hang out in this now empty & half-lit airport together for the night.

Next comes the box of pillows and “blankets” the airline is oh so generously providing for us to sleep with in the closed terminal. The pillows are the tiny pillows you get on planes, and the “blankets” were those thin metallic emergency blankets that you carry into the woods in case you get stranded. They tell us we are allowed to get one of each. No. You can tell me that all day long, but it’s not happening. I took my two pillows, three tin-foil blankets, and walked away.

My buddy and I find a corner away from the group to make our little camp. I put my carry-on bag in the corner, lay the first “blanket” on the floor, sit my laptop bag on top of it, stack my pillows on top of the laptop, lay down, and cover myself with the second “blanket”. It’s around midnight now. Then the floor buffing & vacuuming starts. Oh joy. I didn’t sleep at all, just laid there, until finally some lights started coming back on, around 5am.

Once the lights were on, I gathered my stuff back together and I walked all the way to Concourse A. When I got there, the girl at the desk told me I wasn’t listed on the flight. I told her the situation, and she said that US Airways (the original airline) hadn’t finished some sort of paperwork. She called their desk, and they said that they’d have the paperwork ready when I got back over to Concourse E. So back I go.

I walked all the way back through the airport to Concourse E. I got my new paperwork. I made the girl at that desk call the American Airlines (the new airline) desk in Concourse A and confirm that everything was handled. I get the “good to go”.

I started to walk back. Then a miracle happens. A baggage handler that had seen me walking back-and-forth and cursing to myself told me that he would give me a ride in his cart back to Concourse A. Hell yeah. No hesitation whatsoever from me. He takes my bags, holds the employee door open for me, walks me onto the tarmac, drives me to Concourse A, unloads my stuff, and opens the door for me.

It’s about 6:30 now, so the airport is officially open and bustling with activity. I get to the American Airlines desk, hand the new man the paperwork, and he tells me that THE FLIGHT IS FULL AND THERE IS NO SEAT LEFT FOR ME. At this point, I just lost it. I started trying to explain what happened, but all that came out of my mouth were weird high-pitched noises and I started crying, full-on meltdown level crying, hyperventilating and all. He looked like a deer in headlights. The other person at the desk, and older woman, pushed him aside, told me “Don’t worry honey, we’ll take care of it”, and managed to get me onto the flight. You know what she did? She bumped some businessman in a full suit off to make room for me. How do I know this? I watched her tell him that he was bumped.

So she gets my seat handled, then she took cash out of her own pocket and told me to go get something to eat. She told me not to worry about my bags and tucked them behind the desk. I went to the bathroom to change clothes, and I bought a cinnamon roll, the first food I’d had since the previous afternoon. I walked back to the gate, and before they let anyone else board, she took my luggage and walked me onto the plane. She loaded my bags into the bin and made sure I was seated before they started letting anyone else on. I didn’t even make it through the safety instructions. I just held my un-eaten cinnamon roll in my lap, leaned back on my headrest, and fell asleep, waking up just in time to change planes in Dallas.

When we landed, I ran & took the little shuttle as fast as I possibly could across the Dallas airport. I got to the gate just in time to board my flight to Birmingham, stored my bag in the bin, and crashed back out until we landed in Birmingham. 

You know what happened next? My giant bag with all of my real clothes in it didn’t show up in the luggage carousel. It had gotten lost somewhere in the Philadelphia airport, but American Airlines assured me they would find it and send it to me. Whatever. I didn’t believe them, but I didn’t care at this point. It’s almost 3pm, and I’m just ready to be home.

We get in the car, and my mom calls my dad to tell him she’s got me. I didn’t really know what they were talking about, but when she said “no, I haven’t told her yet”, that got my interest. I thought someone had died. No one died. My puppy that I’d had since I was 8 had a tiny doggie seizure. He was alive but he was confined to a kennel to give him time to recover.

We got to her house, and I just crashed. I slept from the time we got home that afternoon until the next morning. It was glorious.

American Airlines also delivered my giant bag to my mother’s house the next day, safe and sound.