@AmericanAirlines - You Broke a Mother's Heart Last Night

 I can't tell you how excited I have been for the past few weeks as I anticipated Spencer's visit to us in France.

Spencer visited us in 2018 before we moved to the South of France

He has never been here and my hope is that when he walks in the door he feels that same relief, the feeling of coming home, that I do when I visit my parents. 

He scheduled a week off work. That's not easy as an American. We don't get that many weeks. He paid for his own ticket, choosing a slightly more expensive flight so he could limit his airport time. He paid for a checked bag and an aisle seat. 

We planned to pick him up in Barcelona then to drive to Roses, Spain, a beach community on the Mediterranean to spend a night before returning to our home in the south of France. 

We filled out the required forms for him to enter Spain. He got to the airport in Columbus two hours early to check in and he waited for his flight to Philadelphia where he would board his 7:30 flight to Barcelona, arriving there around 9 on Sunday morning. Then he learned the plane from Columbus to Philadelphia was going to be late, then later. Finally, he realized he would miss his connection in Philadelphia. 

He went onto American Airlines chat hoping for help. He stood in line at the American Airlines desk hoping for help. Finally, the agent told him there was a solution. He could catch the Philadelphia flight Saturday evening. Wait in the airport overnight. Take a flight to Boston the next morning at 9 a.m. then wait in the Boston airport for 12 hours before flying to Barcelona and arriving there on Monday around noon. 

That sounded like hell. An extra 27 hours in the airport. 

He called me on FaceTime. I had been lying in bed texting with him as the clock ticked past midnight here. When he called, I scurried from the darkened bedroom to a room with light. His handsome but frustrated face looked at me from the screen. What should he do? 

Spencer and Tucker leaving Paris in 2018

I didn't think anyone deserved 27 extra hours in the airport when they had scheduled a 12-hour flight. He decided to cancel and go home. And that's when my heart broke, realizing I wouldn't be able to hug him, to chat with him as we sat on the beach, to introduce him to all the friends we have made here, to show him amazing castle ruins or take him on bike rides. 

I slept for a few hours then woke up, worried about him, his disappointment, my disappointment. I wondered if he could get a flight from Cincinnati. It has more international flights and is only 90 minutes away. 

I sent him a text, and even though it was the middle of the night for him, he got on chat with American Airlines. No, they told him, he had asked for a reimbursement so now they couldn't help him. 

No take backsies. 

I tried to convince him, via text, to use his charm, but he was pissed by then, and most of us would have been. 

Sunday morning, Earl and I went on a 20-km bike ride hoping it would help relieve some stress, but it only made me sadder.

 The airline should help him get to Barcelona. Why couldn't they arrange a flight for the same price he paid when we booked six weeks earlier? We weren't booking last minute because of our poor planning. It was their last-minute cancellation that caused us to need a last minute flight. 

So many companies could boost their image if they made some sensible choices by helping clients where they can. I'm not asking for a reimbursement of the hotel costs that we paid for rooms in Roses. I  only want my son here for a week, even fewer days now that the original flight was canceled. 

I just want to give him a hug. 

Vacation Drama

I scour news sites, airline sites, airport sites for a definitive answer. Will my flight to Paris go or won't it?
When I see that the flight for Sunday night hasn't been cancelled, and today is Sunday, I despair of learning ahead of time. The people who are scheduled to fly to Paris tonight are still scheduled. Imagine how panicked they must be. Packing, kissing kids goodbye, arranging sitters, changing dollars to Euros. Then they may arrive at the airport and be turned around.

That might be me too.
I look at my list of things to do before we leave and realize I must complete them all, just in case.

I hope and I despair at the same time. I long to go; I have my fears about leaving the kids for a week. Maybe it's worse now that they're older rather than younger.
I'm asking them to make sacrifices. They don't want to stay at their Aunt's house.
"That's like 10 minutes extra every morning on the way to school," Grace complains.
"Okay, 10 minutes a day to school for six days. That equals an hour. I'm asking you to sacrifice an hour for me and Dad."
Huff.
My stomach feels extra jittery as I sit through basketball games and measure the shot put at a track meet. .
Oh, to be in Paris, settled into a seat at a cafe, watching the people hurry past while I sip a teeny, tiny espresso. I drop the sugar cube in and stir it with the little spoon until it dissolves, half sugar/half espresso. Aaaah. The stress of life pools in a puddle at my feet and trickles down the sidewalk. I have left it behind.
I hold hands with my husband and walk along the Seine. We stop to admire artists at work and listen to his spattering of English as he tries to convince us to buy his art.
We linger at dinner, ordering things we aren't sure of then feeling our taste buds come alive again at the touch of the food on our tongues.
In the back of my mind though, that fear that if I do make it to France, I'll be worrying the whole time that I may not make it back. What if the volcano kicks up again and I am stranded in France? Oh, I know there are worse things in life, but the everyday banality of kids and work wait like a ticking clock.