A Side Note to My to Indiana...
02/13/2009
If you read my previous post you got to see exactly where I was mentally just one day after my 65th Birthday. It was not pretty. I was suffering from flatulence of the medulla oblongata. What follows here is an “aside” to this trip. At this very moment I am about 29,000 feet above Kentucky heading for Baltimore and home on Southwest flight 1111. My trip began on another SW flight but going into Indianapolis (Dayton is in 11 days), rather than Louisville. This is where this adventure truly begins.
Southwest flight 745, Baltimore to Indianapolis on February 10, 2009, and I arrived at BWI about two hours prior to the noon departure time. I checked my bag at the kiosk outside the terminal, where some brilliant dude checked my bag in and placed in a pile of bags, maybe fifteen to twenty in a pile about four feet high. He checked my bag but was paying more attention to his co-worker pontificating about Emperor Obama’s Stimulus Package telling another customer his partner knew what he was talking about because the guy had a master’s degree. I suppose that master’s degree meant the guy was an authority of sorts. I should have recognized the fact that my guy was so enthralled and doing more listening to his partner than paying attention to what he was supposed to be doing for me, and that it might translate into trouble for me.
This flight had just twenty-seven passengers on it flying into Indianapolis. When we arrived in Indianapolis just seven of the passengers, including me, went to retrieve baggage at the carousel. The twenty people that carried their belongings on the plane were the smart ones. After waiting over thirty minutes for the baggage for seven people to arrive on the carousel, a mere four bags appeared on the belt…mine not being one of them.
I noted in the previous post how happy I was I had a three hour drive ahead of me because I had not dressed to meet customers. The local sales rep and I had planned an 8:30 appointment for Wednesday. We had to decide if I should risk my bag not getting to our final destination which was about 150 miles from Indianapolis. A quick decision was made it that it might be best if we stayed in Indianapolis because my bag might never have made it to our original destination. Now this may have bothered most people, but, as serendipity would have it, there just happens to be one of my favorite micro-breweries in the Broad Ripple section of the Indianapolis. I drowned my sorrow with some good beer, some good food and a few good friends. I did buy a logo beer glass for my collection, and had another senior moment as I left it in the car of the guy who took me there the bar. My bag finally arrived at the hotel around 10:30 Tuesday night, a mere eight hours after I arrived in Indiana, but it was a sight for sore eyes. The thought of having to wear the same clothing, particularly my undies, for a second day was just not a big thriller for me. With the arrival of my bag to my hotel room, all was right with the world. I had clean underwear. I could use deodorant. I could shave.
Two points here, firstly, Southwest is just another typical airline company, not the Christ Child they make themselves out to be. But, I will still fly with Southwest since this is the first time some misfortune has befallen me on it. I will give SW another chance to screw me before I condemn it entirely.
Secondly, as I sit on this plane I cannot help but think of the forty-eight souls on the Continental flight that went down outside of Buffalo last night. These kinds of events are what ground me. I suppose I had every right to be upset about my missing bag, but I chose not to be. It was a minor happening, no one got injured, no one died, and who am I and who would I be if I allowed such a minor event to ruin my day. I cannot get upset about small shit, especially when the small shit allows me to drink good beer at the Broad Ripple Brewery.
And that is all I have to say about that…