I sit here in my small, messy office, piles of papers, magazines and other detritus littering the floor around me, remembering the first heady days of my trip to Spain and Romania last month.
My mother, who made this trip possible in the first place, arrived the evening before we were to fly to Spain. I hadn’t seen her in about a year, so when she walked in front of me and down to the baggage check to wait for me and my husband to pick her up, I didn’t even recognize her! 45 minutes — and much stressful moments — later we were reunited.
The next evening, when we arrived at the airport, we discovered that Katrina was having her affect on Mom’s flight but not mine. (We were on different flights because she was returning home from Spain, but I was going on to Romania.) She had to take a train to her connecting flight and the next train left in about 30 minutes. We parted ways not knowing if she would make it to Spain in time to meet me there.
After receiving some safety tips from my husband (“Be sure to know where the exit doors are, so if the cabin fills with smoke and you can’t see them, you’ll be able to find them anyway!” Thanks for that vote of confidence in my flight plans) I continued on to the line for the security check. I put my luggage, jacket and purse on the conveyor belt and walked trough the X-ray machine.
Beep! Beep! Beep!
Could it be my watch? I took it off and put it on the conveyor belt. I walked trough the X-ray machine.
Beep! Beep! Beep!
Could it be my money belt? I took it off and put it on the conveyor belt. I walked trough the X-ray machine.
Beep! Beep! Beep!
OK. The security guard motioned over a woman to do the personal search. I put my arms out (like I was pretending to be an airplane) and she scanned my arms. No beep.
She scanned my torso. Beep, but that was just the under wire of my bra. She scanned her own bra to be sure. Yep. Nothing to be concerned about.
She scanned my right leg. No beep.
She scanned my left leg. Beep! Beep! Beep!
Arg! I had completely forgotten that I was wearing my knee brace and it had metal joints! What a dope. I rolled up my knit pants and showed her the brace. She scanned it again. Sure enough, that was beep culprit.
I remembered this for all the future scans I went through. Before entering the x-ray machine, I always rolled up my pant leg and showed the security person my knee brace. And every time, I had to have a personal scan. What fun!
My first flight took me to Philadelphia, where I barely caught my connecting flight to Madrid. It was at the other end of the terminal and I couldn’t run with my knee in the shape it was. But made it, I did and when I got through the passport line in Madrid, my mother was waiting for me with smiles and her tale of barely making her connecting flight in Newark.
Next time … Days in Madrid
