There was a time in my life when I used to look forward to jetting off to far away places — a time when getting there was nearly as romantic as the actual destination itself. I don’t quite know when the bloom fell from the rose, as they say, but suspect it happened the day my flight out to Arizona to interview for a new job was cancelled in Boston, beginning a frantic twenty-four hours that included being stranded overnight in Dallas and showing up a half-day late for my appointment. Fortunately, a friendly traveler with a then-unheard of national cellular calling plan loaned me her phone long enough to clue in my prospective boss to the troubles I was enduring; he was flexible enough that he took the whole thing in stride (and still offered me the job).
Me? I was scarred for life. That incident precipitated a whole slew of neurosis that I fear have only grown worse with age; they include manically checking the weather along the proposed route my flight might take as well as constantly tracking the actual aircraft that will be taking us so I know where it’s coming from — and why it might be delayed. My long-suffering wife has tried to help me come to terms with the notion that just about everything outside of actually buying a ticket are out of my control, and that worrying about any of it is pretty much an exercise in futility. I know that, deep down; I truly do. Still, I always seem to drag her to the airport two hours in advance on the off chance security is having a bad day.
You’d think with all of the conferences I’ve flown to, or trips I’ve taken to see family and friends across the country, I’d be over this. And yet, the examples of why I continue to obsess keep piling up. Did I mention the time I was standing in line at the counter at Tucson International, and the ticket agent couldn’t check me in for my flight — because it had been cancelled? Or maybe that summer I was flying back from seeing my father in Maine — and wound up spending a night in Philadelphia, then another in Los Angeles, stretching the return trip to three extra days. My favorite pre-departure fiasco (if I can call it that) was when a certain airline shifted my flights such that I landed in Atlanta two hours after my flight to Portland took off.
So this is what is running around in the back of my head as my wife and I gear up for a Christmas visit to family in Florida; I’ve tried to assuage some of my concerns by ensuring we have a direct flight, and, honestly, that has tempered a fair amount of my anxiety. It also helps that I’m flying with my wife; having a sane, compassionate and frankly, imperturbable companion that will be able to take charge when I begin to babble incoherently is a solace in its own right that I wouldn’t trade for anything.
That, and a backpack full of chocolate that I can dive into the moment the monitor at the departure gate begins to show scary words such as late or really late or better call our customer service number.
I’ll get through it, of course, and the payoff for swallowing my panic is seeing loved ones that I dearly miss; that, alone, is worth going over the hills and through the woods — even it if it’s not quite the experience it once was. If you are traveling yourself, I hope you have a safe and merry holiday — and we’ll see you on the flip side of the calendar.
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