Today was Gigi's last day with us. The plan was to meet my ex-wife Melissa at the airport at 10:50 and hand her off. I have been advocating that Gigi is getting to the point that she could fly solo as long as it was a direct flight. Melissa has been dead set against this.
This morning, as I was running around trying to organize things for my mom who was watching Lex & Loki, the phone rang. It was 8:20 and it was my ex. I knew her flight was scheduled to depart at 8:30 (7:30 Central) and I had a feeling of dread. I answered as usually do, saying hold on and immediately handing the phone to Gigi. Studies have shown that exposure to radioactive waste and cigarette smoke can shorten your life-span. Dealing with my ex falls squarely between those carcinogens. As Gigi handed the phone back to me, the dread grew.
"They won't let me board the flight," she said.
"You mean you were late and missed your flight." You know that episode of Seinfeld where Elaine tries to see what is in her medical chart? The airlines have that kinda file on my ex. She consistently and habitually pushes the envelope on getting to the airport on time. The beauty of it is she now lives less than 10 minutes from the airport she uses, so she can't even use traffic as an excuse.
"Let's not argue. I need you to tell her she's going to have to fly back alone."
"No, you're telling her." I was not about to be the brunt of that emotional outburst. Bad enough, I was the one who had to deal with the fallout. I handed the phone back to Gigi and within seconds she was screaming and crying. Then, conveniently, Melissa's cell phone lost cell reception. I talked Gigi down, calming her down to the point she could breathe again. I explained that there was nothing I could do about this, but that we would make the best of it. I told her we would leave for the airport early and talk to the airline and see if she could sit up front with a stewardess or that we would look for a family that was travelling that had kids her age and explain the situation and have them "adopt" her for the flight. She had a haunted look on her face, but seemed okay. The phone rang again and it was Melissa. I handed the phone to Gigi and listened to her howl at Melissa that she didn't want to fly alone. After a few minutes, again the cell reception died. Once again, I calmed her down and told her we would make the best of it.
She was freaked now, more-so than earlier. Lex & Loki tried to comfort her the best they could as I called Kitten to tell her the news. Lex sang the 'Gigi song' (a variation of the 'Loki song' he sings when Loki is crying) and Loki hugged Gigi. The three of us calmed her down again and the phone rang again. Melissa said she would talk to her calmly. I handed the phone back and they talked for a few minutes and then Gigi hung up. She threw herself, howling onto the couch screaming she didn't want to go alone and that I couldn't make her. She demanded a lawyer! I sat her down on my lap and told her that she needed to be a big girl and that I sympathized with her being scared. Five minutes of calmness and soothing got us back to pseudo-normal.
I answered and Melissa asked to speak to her. I told her no, that each time I calmed Gigi down, she just riled her up again. Melissa told me the name of the terminal manager that I needed to talk to when I got to the airport. I asked her why she couldn't just fly later in the day or a different day. She couldn't afford to pay the transfer fee and couldn't afford to miss more work. I just had to convince Gigi to fly solo. I told her she needed to come clean about missing the flight and again she lay the blame on the airline. I finally relented and handed the phone to Gigi. They talked and towards the end of the conversation, Gigi began relaying information to me. The airline was going to block out the seat next to her so she would have the aisle to herself. I had to fill out unaccompanied minor paperwork at the ticket counter. And then the kicker. "Mom says we should leave so we get to the airport an hour ahead of time."
Really? Wow! What a concept! "If she had done that, we wouldn't be having this conversation." I snapped back.
I packed her a little survival kit for the drive and the flight. Water and a granola bar, her DS, a couple books.
We left shortly afterwards for the airport. My mom had told Gigi that it was going to be an adventure and that she would be fine (ironic, seeing as my mom has NEVER flown). We left the house 2 1/2 hours before her flight left. We hit traffic. We had trouble finding parking. Guess what? We were at the ticket counter an hour before her flight was scheduled to leave. I explained to the clerk what was going on and I filled out the paperwork and Gigi met Gina, the terminal manager and Gina explained that she was going to meet us down at the gate and get Gigi situated. We went through Security, where I was told I couldn't leave the terminal until her flight was in the air. Made sense. We got to the gate and spent a few minutes buying snacks and sundries. Gina appeared and paged us and before I really had a chance to say good-bye. I gave her a hug and a kiss and wished her good luck.
I had to wait about 15 minutes for the rest of the passengers to embark and then I was sitting in the terminal alone. Gina let me know that Gigi was doing OK and that Gigi had even admitted that she has flown hundreds of times before, just never alone. The stewardesses were taking care of her and she was sitting in the front row all by herself. I explained to Gina that I thought Gigi was old enough to fly solo, but it was my ex that was, ironically, against it. The second I said 'ex-wife', Gina opened up and told me everything that happened with my ex at the airport on the other end. She had arrived at the ticket counter at 7:20 for the 7:30 flight and when they turned her away she had a hissy fit. Freak was the word that the ticket agent there used to describe her. Gina commented that I seemed like such a nice guy and asked me what was I thinking? I laughed, having heard echoes of the question for years now.
Gigi's flight left 10 minutes early and the airline said that her flight was going to land a full 30 minutes early, so I called Melissa to give her a heads up. She still managed to be late to pick Gigi up. Gigi's flight landed at 1:15 and from what Gina had told me, Gigi would have been the 1st one off the plane. By 1:40, I hadn't heard from her so I called Melissa and she explained that she was still in the security line waiting to get through. She ended up getting Gigi over 30 minutes after she got off the plane.
Gigi is doing OK and admitted to me tonight that she was OK doing it, but doesn't want to fly alone in the winter in case there's a snowstorm. I told her not to stress about things and just bask in the fact that she did it today and that she's stronger than she thought.
CCL #483 – Collecting Controversy
5 years ago
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