Rain or snow or shine

It is 4.10 am, and my first of 5 alarms - set 5 minutes apart until 4.30 - does the job. I am not an over-sleeper, but the mere thought of missing my daybreak flight to Minneapolis for a marriage weekend had me go full OCD on the phone alarm last night. Just in case.

Good thing. 4.30 would have been fine for my 6 am flight because the Blountville airport is 10 minutes from my house, and everything was packed and in my car. My clothes were laid out all the way to my earrings. Did I say OCD? 

After I read a few fun WhatsApp messages about scorpions in a friend's home, and creepy things in Australia, a text pops up to let me know my flight was canceled and "We are currently trying to rebook you." For those who don't speak Delta Airlinese, this means, "There is no other flight out of here today that will come even close to getting you where you were planning to go or within several hours of when you wanted to be there. While we're pretending that we can fix this, you better start changing all your plans." 

The thing is, 82 couples on a marriage camp are not going to change their plans. And their plans are mine since I'm their guest speaker this weekend.

Thanks to the adrenaline provided by the photo of the scorpion, I am awake and alert. I find a flight that leaves in two and a half hours from an airport two hours away, so I book it, jump out of bed, dress, grab loose stuff, set GPS to Knoxville Airport, and go!

It is pouring rain and pitch dark. My inner mom voice is going off on me for all the ways in which this is crazy irresponsible. The adventurer in me is visualizing the cabin in the Minnesota snow, where I WILL sleep tonight, no matter what.

Then, the mom is back, wanting to know if I even know where to leave my car when I get to Knoxville? And how far a walk would it be to the terminal from long-term parking?  Do I realize how many accidents could slow down traffic and that I would then miss this flight and not be able to drive back to Blountville in time to catch the "solution flight" Delta had in the meantime come up with, that has me arriving 7 hours late?

I have an inner movie maker too, who works closely with my inner mom. They show me the episode where I arrive practically in another zip code from the airport, hauling all my luggage (I travel with everything) through the pouring rain to the terminal. The movie maker mercifully has me in my best waterproof winter coat with the hood as my umbrella.

MY COAT!!! It's home on the coat rack! I can leave anything except that. It is February in Minnesota. I make the ten minute detour, and the mom is now seriously reprimanding me, knowing I will try to make up the ten minutes as soon as I am back on the strait of the 81 South.

I kind of do what she knows I would, and worse because now Delta tells me to check in, and there is no way to pull over in the pouring rain with a steady stream of 18-wheelers creating the kind of spray that reduces visibility everywhere.

I manage to dig out my credit card from my hand luggage to pay for the bag I want to check in. I figure, if my bag is checked, they'd have to take me. After a few hairy moments of texting and driving between trucks in the rain, they let me know I am no. 2 on standby.

Inner mom is telling me she told me this was nuts (she says polite words like "unwise"; I hear nuts). The movie maker has me drive back and forth between airports for the next three days. I ignore them both. In every case, it is better to be at a bigger airport when you need flight options. Come what may, Knoxville airport it is!

I still need to smooth out my arrival. There was no time to put on make-up. When done beautifully, it could potentially move a person up to no. 1 on standby, if said person were a female with charm turned all the way up, and the official at the counter happened to be impressed by such effort, couldn't it? On the other hand, would one look desperate enough that way?

I'm rehearsing my speech about how I've been up since 4.10 and how they made me drive two hours, and then some drama queen part of me adds on the part where this group of people I am flying to in Minneapolis are Ukrainians (true story), and their country is under siege and being bombed!! Me-mom tells me there is absolutely no way my marriage training in Minneapolis can defeat Putin in Russia, but I am desperate.

The movie maker is now fully engaged as well, and I see that I am standing there at the Delta counter trying to use war in Eastern Europe to secure a seat on the plane through Detroit, with my turquoise rubber tube hair rollers still twisted in all directions on my head. Ha! Now, if that does not scream desperation even more loudly than international turmoil, I don't know what does!

A friend sends a voice note in reply to my SOS message to please pray while I combat night blindness and pouring rain. Her voice note is a precious prayer. I take it all in. I remember God's provision in many a similar messy situation, and I make peace with whatever happens. I see myself in the beautiful snow-covered cabin, and I just know I will get there somehow. I see the precious people, and I know that if I have something they need, God will see to it that they get it. 

I decide that when I miraculously find a parking spot near the terminal, I will do everyone a favor by pulling out the hair rollers before checking in.

The parking signs are so clear that a mom must have put them up for her favorite baby to find his way. The undercover parking is completely packed, so I just do what the movie maker had scripted. I park in the pouring rain, pull my hoodie low over my eyebrows, wheel my two suitcases through the puddles, and follow a kindly man's directions to the check-in counter.

A kind young man announces cheerily that I have a seat on the plane! I apologize for the no-make-up situation, explaining the hasty 4.30 am departure. A person giving such good news deserves so much better from me, doesn't he?

Overcome with gratitude, I hold my boarding passes like trophies in my one hand while leaving a voice note with the other to tell my Minnesota friends that I'll be coming after all - only an hour later than planned!

I am giddy as I step into the security checkline. In front of me is a size 1 blonde woman in a navy-blue sun dress, a white hat, and straw color wedge sandals. Her toenails are done in a perfect French pedi. I want to thank her for making our species look so good to the world, but even the movie maker thinks it is just a bit too much. But I really want to. Because women like her are probably always either viewed with jealousy or with lust. I feel respect and appreciation for her and wish I could just give her that much.

Still in this obviously overly grateful and appreciative mood, it is my turn to go through the scanner. I do the whole thing automatically by now. Boots off and in basket one with coat, laptop out and in basket two with phone, bag with food (long story for another blog coming soon) in basket three, laptop bag in basket four.

The officer attracts my attention with a motion towards my neck. Both wearing masks, it is a little harder to make out the communication. I catch the word "scarf." It is my first time wearing this scarf, and it has all my best colors. What a nice man, I think. Complimenting my scarf while on duty! America is such a jovial place!

"Thank you," I say extra loudly through my mask as I pat the item in question. He uses extra volume, too, as he replies, "Take it off!" I blush, comply, and put it in the basket along with all the unruly positivity that now really needs to be calmed down all the way to avoid further embarrassing incidents.

I visit the restroom to adjust the curly messy bun I made in my car earlier, and it's time to board. As I step onto the plane, a charming air hostess exclaims loudly enough for several passengers to hear, "Oh, I lOVE that scarf!"

I dig out the giddy gratitude of earlier that almost made me compliment a strange lady and that made me mistake a command for flattery, and I decide that today I will be a blabbering, praising, presumptuous person, rather than a bland person, boringly following Plan A, and I will have a great day, come rain, snow, or shine.