There and Back Again: A Mother's Tale II

Life in a Nutshell

And so, the night before we leave, we spend no time cleaning or packing....just visiting with family one last time. We go home, and I push through 2 loads of laundry while we go through our "routine" of getting the kids to bed (sans Beth screaming). That night, I have a dream that while we are driving down to Seattle, the flight gets overbooked and we're stranded. And so the next day, I have DH check the flight about a billion times. The only thing we find out that is a bit of a problem is that the flight is now delayed an hour. And so we will now be getting in at 12am, Dallas time. That would be 10pm BC time....not too bad, pushing it a little, but do-able. With 87 seats available, we should be able to stretch out....

And so off we go. We glide through the border, and endure the 2 hour drive punctuated with a few fights between the boys, whining by DD#1 and screaming from DD#3. DD#2 slept awhile and then had a snack. I was pretty frusterated by the time we got there. With luggage and kids in tow, we maneuver our way to the tight-lipped smile of the ticket agent in Seattle. I HATE the agents in Seattle, they are sooo smug and condescending to stand-by's. THEY fly stand-by too...why do they enjoy the problems of others doing the same? Is it b/c we have 5 kids? ARGH. Anyway, the conversation went like this:

agent: Where are you going?
Me: Dallas
agent: what time?
Me: 6:30 (knowing the delay)
agent: we don't have a flight at that time
Me: ok, 5:30 (the original flight time)
agent (blank look)
Andrew: flight 1232
agent: that flight doesn't take off until 7:30!
(a twinge of triumph in her voice)
Andrew: oh, why the delay?
agent: (smugly) maintenance

End of conversation. No boarding passes, and no explanation as to why. (the flight is wide open, right???) So, we slowly make our way to security, stopping at the bathroom. We have tons of time to kill....
We go through security, the kids doing great. They have to search one of our carry-ons, the one packed full of food. The first thing the guys does is pull an opened bag of Pepperidge Farm Goldfish the wrong way

"Oh! Sorry about that!"
(sigh)

The kids and I make our way to the gate while Andrew doubles back to security to get DD#3's diaper bag which we left. We hang out at the gate, eating dinner and waiting for our plane to board. Finally, we board, and situate ourselves at the rear of the plane, in front of the flight attendants row, who are nice enough to let us put DD#3 down across the seats while she sleeps. (turns out, there were 50 people on stand-by, not 16...hence, no boarding passes until we were at the gate) Eventually, we took over the whole row as DS#2 needed to stretch out as well.

The kids were great....troopers, I would say. DD#2 threw a humongous fit when we were getting off the plane....she wanted to stay on! DH had to drag her off the plane and down the jet bridge kicking and screaming (which was the name of the movie they showed on the flight, btw) where he stopped to try to reason with her. No dice. He was kicked off the jet bridge by security, so he proceeded to the terminal area, where he tried to reason with her. No dice. He was kicked out of there by security, and so he had to bring her to baggage claim after the passengers had left. The remaining 4 kids and I had to haul the 5 suitcases, diaper bag, and DD#3 (who's not mobile yet) out to the curb and down the sidewalk to call for a taxi. (keep in mind it's 2am). I am so proud of how well they did. No complaining or whining at all! And DD#2? Well, it all ended when DH asked, "Do you want to watch Clifford when we get home?" She stopped screaming, looked up at him, said "Otay" and calmly picked up her blanket and walked toward the terminal door. Happy ending. Pictures soon.