Part 1 of 3
James

Occurred March 25, 2018

James was scheduled to leave Denver late. It was Saturday. He had been away from home and his wife Emily, and their two daughters for almost two weeks. First was Phoenix, training. That was held over a day because it was determined they needed to make changes to the syllabus he had spent the better part of a month preparing. Then, on to Denver, where his company is headquartered. It seemed like nothing went right this trip. And, he felt like there were some precious memories he was missing at home in Frisco. Both his daughters had music recitals and sports activities, none of which James could obviously attend.

The Denver leg came with its own calamities. The first night, his room at the Fairfield had some environmental issues. The thermostat didn’t seem to be working so the heat was on or off. James was able to move to a different Marriott property altogether closer to his company’s address day two but that was the least of day two’s obstacles. His rental car had some kind of electrical failure. He had to use Lyft to get to HQ, late of course. Finally, he was given a nice Lincoln to drive for the remainder of his stay.

He had a late flight Saturday because he had expected to be in meetings most of the morning. When the meetings were cancelled, James decided to try for an earlier flight with American to get home to his family.

James went to fuel up the Lincoln before turning in. While fueling the vehicle he called his boss. Just as his boss said hello, James heard something splashing on the ground and turned to see fuel going everywhere because the nozzle didn’t auto-shutoff. He didn’t see an emergency shutoff button so he wrestled with the nozzle until it shut off while spewing gas everywhere. He had to call his boss back.
It didn’t stop there. Once he got the Lincoln, which was drenched on the side with fuel, back to the drop off, he began removing his stuff. He placed his trusty Starbucks coffee mug on the trunk of the car and then moved to the other side to pull out his bags. The attendant had already begun checking mileage and other items in the car without really acknowledging James’ presence. James once again called his boss to update him. The attendant popped the button on the trunk, sending James’ coffee mug flying through the air straight toward him. Instant reflex kicked in and he caught it but down went the phone with his boss still on the other end. The attendant didn’t notice anything and hustled away. James had a nice new cracked screen. But, he at least was able to finish the call with his boss.

James was starting to wonder, what next? Well…

There were two earlier flights on American to DFW and both were overbooked. American was looking to get 17 people on the first flight alone to volunteer to take another flight. James heard from another passenger, American offered one traveler $1,000 to give up his seat.
Okay, so no going home early. Now James would just have to settle in and wait until his 5pm flight. So his plane would arrive around 345 or so and then he would board after they fuel it and load bags, etc. A few minutes after the plane landed and most of the passengers had departed, there was an announcement that the flight would be delayed due to a technical problem. Exhausted and eager to get home, James asked the gate agent what was going on. Apparently, a departing passenger somehow triggered an emergency inflatable device (wasn’t clear exactly what this was, but assuming a raft?) inside the aircraft and now maintenance was trying to figure out what to do and whether or not the plane would be returned to service.

Now James was a seasoned business traveler so he knows there will always be issues from time to time but on this particular trip he was feeling cursed. It was finally determined the aircraft would not be airworthy in time to fly James and his fellow travelers back to DFW, so American announced they would be flying another aircraft in for their flight but it would take another 3 hours or so. And get this, it was coming from DFW!

The plane did arrive and the passengers were loaded and swiftly air born, bound for Dallas! James began to feel some momentum. Could he be leaving the curse behind in Denver? Nope! There was a 25 minutes delay with the baggage system. Ha! Now James was feeling completely beat down and defeated as he dragged his bag out the door of Terminal C, praying to God, “Please Lord, I just want to go home.”

James opened up his Lyft app and requested a car. The nearest one was 17 minutes away. Standing outside the terminal, well after midnight, James tried Lyft one more time. This time the nearest driver was 11 minutes away. James made the request and stood there aching and tired and wishing he could be home with his wife and his girls, wishing he could finally sleep in his own bed. He checked the app and sure enough, here came the vehicle he requested, he could see the Lyft light in the dash matching the color on his phone so he knew that one was for him. One more leg of this trip and he was home. “Please let this ride be smooth and without any issues…”

#Kindness #purposefulkindness #Whatawonderfulworld #hope #peace #love #joy #StreetLights #TheKindnessClub #Grace #weareallconnected