I don't do well with airports.
A good rule of thumb would be for people to pretty much never depend on me to pick them up or drop them off at airports. Things just always seem to go awry, when both an airport and I are involved. Even if there is no actual air travel in the equation, the mere proximity of an airport within a six mile radius is a recipe for disaster.
One time, my friend Jenn's family decided to give each other a trip to Cancun in lieu of Christmas gifts. Except Jenn didn't want to go to Cancun; she wanted a car. So she accepted her portion of the trip in cash and used it to buy a car. That's a whole 'nother story, though -- the Tale of Jenn's Car That She Bought For $300. I'll write that one of up someday.
Anyway, the upshot of the Cancun/car deal was that Jenn was supposed to pick her mom and her three sisters up from Bradley International Airport upon their return. The problem, of course, was that Jenn was afraid of driving on the highway. So she enlisted my help because if there is one thing I enjoy doing, it is driving really, really fast.
For some reason, it was decided that we would drive Jenn's mom's car, which was a Dodge Aries. I don't remember why I was driving her mom's car; it may have been an issue of me not having gas in my car, or maybe it was because I was car-less for some reason. It doesn't matter.
I was fine with the whole concept of picking up my friend's family at the airport, until Jenn sprung it on me that we had to pick them up at 7 AM. On a Saturday morning.
"7 AM? You're kidding. Why are they arriving at 7 AM?"
"You know how my mom likes to get up early."
(That part was true -- Jenn's mom habitually rose at 4 AM, for reasons that we never fully understood.)
"But that means they are leaving Cancun at like 5 AM??!!!"
"My mom always does stuff like that. Remember how we always have Thanksgiving dinner at 10 AM?"
We chalked the unlikely arrival hour up to Jenn's mom's innate weirdness. It did, however, raise a problem; namely that we would have to leave around 5:30 AM to get to the airport in time. And I, unlike Jenn's mom, am NOT a morning person.
"Why are they flying into Bradley? Why not LaGuardia? That's so much closer!"
"I don't know. She must have gotten a cheaper rate or something. You know how she likes bargains."
The big problem here was that we were having this conversation at around 1 AM on Friday night. So I was pretty sure that the chances of me actually waking up at 5 AM to drive to the airport were pretty slim. I was a notorious oversleeper.
I decided the best plan, to avoid oversleeping, would be to stay up all night. Which seemed like a good idea at the time. Because driving to an unknown destination is always better when you've been awake for twenty-two consecutive hours.
Around 4:45 AM, I was starting to nod off. I countered this by taking a shower. When I got out of the shower, I noticed that it had apparently been snowing for some time. That was fantastic. Because sleep-deprived people always do better driving in snow.
We got into the car and started heading in the general direction of the airport.
"Jenn?"
"What?"
"Where's the airport?"
"It's in Hartford, I think."
"Oh."
I had a vague idea of how to get to Hartford; I'd driven through it on a few occasions, usually on our way to Boston. I hadn't noticed any airports, but then again, I hadn't really been looking for them. I figured that there would probably be signs or something. How hard can it be to find an airport?
We headed north on I-95. The snow was really starting to come down. Somewhere around New Haven, we got onto I-91 and confirmed we were going in the direction of Hartford.
I-95 had been pretty clear, but it was snowing a lot harder once we turned away from the coast. I-91 was pretty snowy. Truth be told, I was getting a little nervous driving Jenn's mom's car; we were slipping and sliding around quite a bit.
The snow started really coming down. I couldn't see where I was going, so I decided to follow a truck. All I could make out through the snow was its taillights. We named it "The Truck of Safety" and had every confidence it would not lead us astray.
We probably should have named it "The Truck of Getting Off At Random Exits Without Signalling," though, because that is what it did. I realized just in time that it was not leading me to Hartford after all, and slammed on the brakes to avoid following it onto the off ramp.
Of course, slamming on your brakes is the worst possible thing to do on a slippery, snowy road, when you are sleep-deprived and driving a Dodge Aries-K. We did a nice fishtail and locked into a skid. I avoided hitting anything, which made me very proud; but we did end up stuck in a snowdrift.
Jenn and I got out to assess the situation.
"We need a shovel. Do you have a shovel in the trunk?"
"Why would we have a shovel in the trunk? We don't travel around looking for holes to dig."
We checked in the trunk. There were two tennis racquets, left over from our brief foray into Tennis As A Recreational Activity (that's going to have to be a post of its own). But no shovel. In fact, there was really nothing even vaguely shovel-like.
We considered using the tennis racquets, but didn't see how that would help the situation.
While we were standing there contemplating our lot, a car stopped and a guy in military fatigues got out. He wanted to know how far it was to New Haven.
We pointed out that he was traveling away from New Haven, and in fact was halfway to Hartford. It seemed he was supposed to report to some sort of military thing in New Haven, but since he was already late and going in the wrong direction, he opted to try to help us.
Another guy stopped; he was the driver of a Stop & Shop truck. Neither he nor the Army guy had a shovel, though.
They tried a variety of methods for extricating the Aries-K from the snowdrift. Pushing it, kicking the snow, swearing at it, rocking it back and forth -- none were successful. It seemed that the car was balance on top of a small heap of snow, so the tires were not actually touching the ground. We tried piling snow up under the tires but that didn't work either.
Eventually, Army Guy and Stop & Shop Guy decided to give the tennis racquets a try. They attempted to use them as shovels, but mostly ended up just making little waffle patterns in the snow.
Suddenly, out of nowhere, a car stopped and a little old man with a garden shovel got out. Without a word, he ran over, dug the snow out from under the Aries-K, and was gone almost before we could thank him.
We thanked Army Guy and Stop & Shop Guy, and resumed our drive towards Hartford.
The snow had stopped, and the sun was coming out. It was a beautiful winter day; but we had made a disconcerting discovery: there didn't seem to be an airport in Hartford after all. It seemed that the airport was actually north of Hartford; in Windsor Locks, to be exact.
Since I get confused by things like "north" and "south," "left" and "right," it took a few false starts before we finally made it to Bradley International Airport. It was by now 7:30 AM. Jenn was in panic mode; her mom didn't like to be kept waiting.
We sprinted through the airport, looking for the arrival gate.
"What airline are they on?"
"Air Cancun."
"You're kidding."
"No, really! It's Air Cancun. At least...I'm pretty sure it's Air Cancun."
"There is actually an airline called Air Cancun? Why would they ... never mind. It must have been a bargain priced ticket, right?"
"Mom loves bargains."
We ran through the airport, glancing at all the various airline gates. Delta, American, United, USAir...all the major airlines seemed to have large information desks with large signs. There did not seem to be anything for Air Cancun.
Finally...and I swear I am NOT making this up ... we saw a small desk, like you would have in an office, with an "Air Cancun" sign above it. We raced to it and breathlessly inquired where we should go for the 7 AM arrival.
"There's no 7 AM arrival."
"Oh...is it delayed?"
"No...we don't have a flight coming in. We only have one flight per day -- it's arriving at 7 PM."
We stood there like slack-jawed cretins. It took a few moments for our sleep-deprived minds to process this information.
We had stayed up all night and gotten stranded in a snowdrift FOR NO REASON.
It was too confusing to try to think of what to do next. Plus, we were starving. We decided that we would go out to breakfast, then decide what to do.
The only problem was that we had absolutely no cash on us. In fact, all we had was an American Express card. It turned out that shockingly few breakfast-selling establishments took American Express.
Finally, we found a place that would accept this form of payment. It was the Holiday Inn Crowne Plaza. We were hoping for some sort of buffet; but were ushered into a restaurant with white tablecloths. It was certainly a step up from our usual dining habits.
While I perused the menu, I noticed some fine print stating that there was a $20 minimum for American Express orders. It took some effort to order enough breakfast foods to meet the minimum, but we managed to do it.
As we sat there devouring our muffins, yogurt, fresh fruit, pancakes, bacon, and orange juice, a friendly older couple sat down at the table next to ours. We were the only people in the restaurant, and they were apparently from some other, friendlier, culture, as they struck up a conversation with us.
"Where are you girls from?"
"Greenwich...it's down by New York City."
"Greenwich! Oh, isn't that where Donald Trump lives?"
"Uh...I guess so. I don't actually know him, or anything."
"Did you hear that? They live near Trump!"
"I think he's only there on weekends, maybe. But I saw Ron Howard at the gas station, once."
"Ron Howard! He lives in Greenwich, too?"
"Yeah. He was wearing flip-flops."
This news amazed them. It was like we were celebrities, ourselves. Encouraged by their enthusiasm, we volunteered information on other celebrity sightings.
"Ivan Lendl gave me the finger, once."
"Ricky Schroeder went to my junior high, for a couple weeks. Then he transferred because everyone was mean to him."
"Tom Seaver comes into our ice cream store all the time. He always gets a quart of Gold Medal Ribbon. That's vanilla ice cream with fudge swirl and a caramel ribbon. He scoops it himself because he knows we hate it because it's always frozen solid."
The older couple were suitably impressed with our knowledge of high society. We were running out of celebrities sightings, however, so we started telling them the story of our trip to the airport, complete with the tennis racquets, waffle patterns in the snow, and the tragic AM/PM mix-up.
It may have been a slightly disjointed re-telling, because we were both really very sleep-deprived and kept forgetting important bits and then yelling them out later in the story. The older couple looked confused but made sympathetic noises. I told them that the worst part of it all was that it was my birthday, and I was spending it driving around some God-forsaken part of Connecticut frantically searching for bargain-priced airline arrival gates.
Finally, it was time for them to leave. We were still trying to eat the massive breakfast assortment we had ordered, so we waved goodbye to them. As soon as they left, a waitress emerged with two slices of cake for us.
"It's from that couple that just left. They said for you to try to enjoy your birthday."
We were dumbfounded. No one had ever done anything this nice for us, ever! We had never encountered strangers who would purchase cake for confused girls in hotel restaurants! Our hearts were warmed, indeed. And, it was carrot cake, with cream cheese frosting -- my absolute favorite cake.
When we were asked for the check, we got a second surprise. The older couple HAD PAID OUR ENTIRE BILL!!!!! And just left, without saying a word about it!
We thought we might explode, from sheer heart-warmingness. Vowing to spread joy and happiness wherever we went, from this moment forward, as a tribute to them, we left the restaurant and headed back to the car.
It turned out that the windshield washer fluid thing was broken, and the windshield kept getting that white crud all over it from the salt on the road. Jenn had to hang out the passenger window and periodically spray Windex all over it, so that I could clear it enough to see out of. We were tired and had to go to work and knew we had to repeat the whole adventure again that evening at 7 PM, but our faith in humanity had been restored.
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