I’m traveling again. Driving last Thursday night, brief stop to sleep, and on to Myrtle Beach for a couple of days. Flew out of Charleston, SC through Charlotte, NC to Orlando yesterday–and today. Sort of officially “flights from hell.” Yes, not one but two flights delayed by mechanical problems.
They kept pushing back the estimated time of my 4 pm flight until it finally took off at 7:30. Missed my 8 pm to Orlando. By the time that I knew that was going to happen, I called the United premier access hot line. But, I was flying on a partner Star Alliance company (US Airways) so United couldn’t help me. <sigh> So now I’m standing in line for 30-45 minutes. Poor gate agents have to rebook all of us. Something like 80 people on the commuter flight.
One woman in line with me was going to miss part of a meeting plus spend the night in a hotel with all her toiletries in her checked bag (which would stay checked). Another woman was getting to Denver a day late. One guy had a 7am training session in Seattle, so he had purchased Monday Night Football tickets. He just cancelled out. They couldn’t get him to Seattle early enough (he gave his tickets to his brother–hint).
The entire time I was in line (or queue for my European readers) there was just one difficult woman and one couple who needed to vent. Otherwise, we were all disappointed, but just worked the best we could. Goes to show that despite ideas you might form from reading newspapers, by and large people are basically nice.
I was close to the end. The gate agent was frazzled from the pressure. She helped me tremendously (I’m in Orlando, after all). I just smiled and thanked her and said, “Just take a deep Yoga breath and then help the next person (the Seattle guy).” And she relaxed a little and smiled.
Hey, that’s all you can do. Help people who are helping you.
Faith Venture 
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