Flyover State of Mind

It’s Thursday, once again, which usually means it's time for me to hand out my weekly dose of judgment. I didn’t post last week due to the annual November festival dedicated to uncomfortable gatherings of people and gluttonous living. That’s right, I’m talking about Black Friday. Now, I’m sure most of you are probably expecting me to double down this week in my righteous, judgmental wrath against Andy Murray (I was expecting that too), but experiences last week have necessitated we take a different path today.

Next week Murray! You'll get our vengeance and furious anger!

Last week I, and several Coe players, were delayed at the airport in our attempts to go home over the holiday break. This is my story of that time.

Before we can talk about what did happen, I need to explain what should have happened. What my plans were.  I was supposed to fly to Texas Tuesday evening. Wednesday, I planned to meet some friends in Dallas and go on a super-extravaganza winter shopping spree that culminated in visiting Coach Rodgers’ favorite store, REI which happens to be where one of my friends works (it helps to have friends in the right places). Thursday would be Thanksgiving with the family, and Friday would be spent at a high school football game and then more time with friends. It was going to be a great holiday break.

That is what was supposed to happen. It’s time, now, for the story of what actually happened. You all know how this story ends: failure. It’s how we get to that failure that I will tell you about. We are going on a journey, you and I, into the depths of our selves and what we learn here will go with us forever (or at least for the next few moments). Welcome to therapy; coping with travel anguish. Get ready to lay down on the couch and tap into your emotions because it's time to deal with a little grief through the psyche of Brad Fenter.

Our story begins, as so many of these often do, with a gathering that has great promise. I arrived at the airport at the appointed time and ran into several tennis players making their way home (Mark Kroll, Alex Leovic, and Diannah Watson). We were all getting ready for our journeys home. For Mark and Diannah this was their first college Thanksgiving, and it was marked with all the travel and excitement of seeing family that many students encounter every year. For others like Leo and me, this was standard fare that we have become accustomed to every year.

Right now, there is only the promise of a journey for each of us that will lead to family and friends over a holiday celebrated across the nation. Obviously, our trip now begins to takes downward turn.

My flight was running a few minutes behind, but  there wasn’t any cause for worry. The gate agent said the plane would be landing in six minutes and then we would be boarded quickly. As we walked onto the aircraft I could see that not only had the sun set, but there was a darkness seemingly sprawling out across the plains. Darkness is a natural occurrence with the onset of night, but that always comes from the east. This crawling void was coming from the wrong direction. Others too must have felt something was wrong, and I could hear them asking the pilots about the weather. The pilots seemed nonplussed, “visibility is still good and we have a good window to get you to Dallas.” If the guy flying the plane thought everything was fine, then that was good enough for me.  

Unfortunately, other forces were conspiring against us as well. When everyone was buckled in and we were ready to push back it must have occurred to the crew that our plane hadn’t been refueled! So we waited as the fuel truck pulled up and the process of fueling the plane began (when I say “process” I really mean it).  It was almost comical how slow the guy fueling the plane was. If this was a movie, audiences would complain that the ineptitude of the fuel person was overplayed in order to perpetuate the plot. I spent most of this time hoping it was this guys first day because he was lacking in the energy department. It took 5 MINUTES for him to get the gas cap off - which incidentally is located on top of the wing of this plane. Then pump, and pump, and pump some more. When taking on 7,000 lbs of fuel it takes a little longer to fil-er-up than your average Civic. And no, I'm not exaggerating that number at all, 7,000 lbs is the amount the pilot specified to me when I asked how long it was going to take Humpty Dumpty to finish the job.

He's just as fast as he looks

At every moment of our lives our mind is taking in and storing more information than we could ever be consciously aware of. I've flown enough to know, subconsciously at least, when things aren't going right. I like to watch the workers on the tarmac go about readying the plane for takeoff. When something is wrong, in flying and everything else, people have a different feel to them. What is this feeling? I can't tell you, but my brain (and yours) is hardwired to pick up on these things. Whatever the cues were, everyone on that plane probably felt the same sense of foreboding I talked about when boarding earlier. The delay, the clouds, the subtle change in the cadence of the workers; it all served to heighten our senses and inform us that something was awry.

Like many times before, our senses were dead on. Those extra 10 minutes molasses man cost us with his less than sublime handling of the fuel happened to be the last 10 minutes of good visibility as dense fog rolled in. Right after we were fueled and ready to roll we heard this, "this is the captain, it looks like visibility is too limited for takeoff. We're going to taxi out anyway and see if we can get out of here.” Spoiler alert: we didn't. We taxied out the end of the runway and waited.

During our time on the runway every passenger on the plane had to deal with the circumstances that had surrounded us.  I went through my own five stages of grief. My therapist? God.

And how does that make you feel? Angry?

5:15 pm Denial

Surely we're going to take off. They wouldn't taxi all the way out here if they didn't plan on taking off. The tower guys must see a break of some sort in the fog. Yeah, we're definitely going to get out of here at some point. That’s the only thing that makes sense.

I was playing down my knowledge that fog doesn’t usually lift until the sun comes up in the morning. In this stage I wasn’t ready to acknowledge this fact yet.

5:40 Anger

STUPID FOG! What the hell is fog anyway and how can we not take off in fog!? If you're flying at night, what's a little fog mean? It's still dark! It’s not like you’re going to have landmarks to go by during night flying anyway.

God, if we're going to get delayed is it too much to ask for a tornadic event to justify this? If not tornadoes, would a thunderstorm kill you!?

6:10 Bargaining

Okay God, at this point I'm willing to settle for a little precipitation to justify our continued not-flight status.

Either way, we'll get out of here at some point. You know, now that I think about it I don't even have to leave immediately. A few hour delay won't hurt as long as we get out of here tonight.

At this point I had actually made arrangements for a friend to pick me up in Dallas due to the delay. I my mind, things could actually work out much better than I had originally planned.

6:45 Depression

Captain, "we going back to the gate, you need to go to the ticketing counter and re-schedule."

As I made my way to the ticketing counter I assumed I would be placed on an early flight in the morning. This way I would still be able to do see all my friends and be with my family over Thanksgiving. I still couldn’t bring to the forefront of my mind the thought that there are a limited number of flights out of Cedar Rapids each day and with holiday travel many of these would be full.

While waiting in line I could hear other people in front of me settling for tickets on the earliest flights they could find which were still late tomorrow afternoon. My mind shut those thoughts out as well. I finally got my chance to see the ticket agent.

Ticket Agent: Let's see. The earliest flight I can get you on is tomorrow at 4:50pm.

Me: that's the earliest?

Panic was now rising in my mind. The two sides of my brain were at war. The rational side of me said there was nothing else to be done, and I knew all along this was a possibility. It was time to move on. The other side of me, the emotional side, still held on hope of getting back earlier. Still held onto the plan I had crafted over the last few weeks.

Ticket Agent: Yes that’s the first open flight we have tomorrow.

Me: Is there anything else? Any other airport close by?

I knew there was nothing else and so did the ticket agent.

Ticket Agent: I can extend your stay for another day if you want me to?

Finally my emotional side with it dreams and hopes capitulated. The battle was lost. Those who cannot adapt their plans to the changes around them do not survive.

Me: No, just give me the ticket. That's fine. I'm going to go sit in the corner and cry.

I now knew beyond any doubt I would not be flying home that night. I would not get to see my family. I would not get to see my friends in Dallas. And I would not get 30% off winter clothes on my shopping extravaganza!

In case you can't tell, EVERYTHING is cancelled

8:00 Acceptance

This stage took the longest find. The process began immediately but the final result came about of its own fruition no matter how much I wished it to occur sooner.  Like I said, it's as if we have two selves and our emotional controlling subconscious self does things for its own reasons and in its own time.

So, as I sat in my room after I had called my parents and my sister and my friends, whom I would not get to see, a realization came over me. A realization that I had known the entire time, but which my emotional side – as always – withheld until now: everything was going to be fine. I wished this feeling had been present from the beginning, as all of us do, but our inner self will not release this innate knowledge until we have earned it.

I should have been more accessible to changing my plans. One of the biggest problems in this situation was my determination to keep to the arbitrary schedule I had made. Even though there were events out of my control that could drastically change what was possible, I still held on to the thought that I was totally in control of my situation. I had recently read the book Deep Survival by Laurence Gonzales in which he talks about adapting to our situations in order to survive. Making a plan is a good step, but you must be willing to change that plan based on changes in the environment around you. It was with a sense of irony that I realized I had just read extensively about adapting plans based on outside factors and then failed to do just that in my own situation.

The next day I did make it to Texas. I did see my friends. I did have Thanksgiving with my family. I did nearly everything that I had originally wanted to do; these events simply unfolded differently than I had originally planned. I even had an encounter with my old friend/nemesis coffee and was educated on the differences between a latte and cappuccino. I have no recollection of what these differences are, but the knowledge was good while it lasted.

This is apparently a cappuccino

I was scheduled to fly back to Iowa this past Monday and arrived at the airport at the scheduled time. The time to start boarding came…and went. And we were still sitting in the terminal. It’s okay, we’re probably going to start boarding any minute. A few more minutes passed and we still hadn’t boarded. This is no problem Brad, you are fully equipped to handle this situation. We’ll board soon, you’ll make it back to Iowa, and it’s not weird that you keep talking to yourself. Ten more minutes passed and there I sat. In the terminal. Unmoved. Okay we can do it that way too.

7:00am Denial