This weekend I was supposed to fly out of the O’Hare airport to Manchester, where my brother would meet me, and we would drive home to Jericho VT. That didn’t happen. My first flight was cancelled by United Airlines, which usually isn’t a big deal. I went to my gate and asked an agent for help, who promptly reported back to me that she couldn’t help me. She said she “wasn’t working.” I thought this to be odd, since she was in uniform, sitting at a front desk, doing absolutely nothing. Bewildered, I wandered the fourteen miles to the other end of the airport, where the customer service desk was conveniently located under a life size replica of a tyrannosaurus rex. This also confused me, but I got in line. There were two representatives of United working at two separate computers, although there were at least eight other computers that could have been in use. After waiting in line for a while, I began to panic. I was listening to the representatives tell the stranded passengers ahead of me that there were no flights today. They would have to wait until tomorrow. When my turn finally came to be helped, it did nothing but further my panic. The squatty man sitting in front of me did not look enthused, and his mustache had bits of what I identified to be croissant in it. Every two minutes he would stop what he was doing completely, and sip out of a jug of McDonald’s sweet tea. I wanted to scream. He mumbled to me that there were no options for me to get to Manchester through United today, despite my desperate pleas. I informed him that my final destination was VT, and asked him politely if there was anything flying in to Burlington. He paused to suck on some sweet tea before checking the computer. He told me through his croissant-speckled mustache that there was a flight to Rhode Island, and he could book me for that. This is when I stopped being polite. I sternly told him that Rhode Island is actually in the opposite direction of where I was trying to go, and asked him how that would help me at all. I used violent hand gestures to really get my point across. Eventually, he booked me on a flight to Laguardia, where I would connect to yet another flight to bring me home. I left the desk with fiery cheeks and tears in my eyes. I only had so long with my family this weekend, and each time a flight was changed I lost valuable time.
While waiting for my new flight, all I could think about was how I should have already been in the air. I finally boarded the Laguardia flight, and was delighted to find that I was in front of a screaming baby. I ignored this fact and tried to focus on the positive: I was finally going home! Once all the passengers were boarded, the captain came on the speaker to tell us that Laguardia airport had a complete ground stop due to the weather. He gave us updates every 30 minutes, that weren’t really updates at all. He just kept telling us the same information while using different vocabulary. After about an hour of being assaulted from behind by a demon in infant form, I got a call from United Airlines. A pre recorded robotic voice told me that my connecting flight in Laguardia had been cancelled. I dropped my phone and put my face in my hands. I began to silently weep, wondering why the Lord Almighty wouldn’t allow me the simple task of flying home. I called both my parents, informed them of my predicament, and got off the plane. The walk out of the airport was traumatic. I was angry, distraught, and blubbering on the phone to my mom. I braced my hands against a wall and began to hyperventilate, leaving all maturity behind. I couldn’t quite catch my breathe, but was somehow still able to heave swear words into the phone. To people passing, I must have looked like I had received news of a death, or some other life changing tragedy. In reality, I was just sleep deprived and frustrated. I had spent nine hours in an airport waiting to go home only to be told that I couldn’t. I had dealt with dehydrated customer service representatives with a hankering for sweet tea, and agents who decided that they didn’t seem to understand that by coming to work, they’re obligated to do their job.
On the hour train ride home, I caught a glimpse of myself in the smudged window. My eyes were swollen and purple from salty tears, and my mouth was wrenched into a horrifying frown. I thought about how I could have handled the situation better…but sometimes it’s just easier to pout.
No comments:
Post a Comment