Catch-up Part 2: Home

Although I thoroughly enjoyed my time in Nicaragua, I was glad to be back in the states. My first night back, I stayed at my friend Sam’s in Dayton. He welcomed me back with familiar diet staples of mine: milk, cereal, and ice cream. What a guy! The next morning I rode back to Jackson with my sister Monica, who was nice enough to make the drive down to Dayton to pick me up. I was looking at five full days with the family before I had another plane to board. I did my best to knock off items systematically on the “To-Do” list, but some things were more of a challenge than I expected. My younger sister Gretchen luckily was already out of school, so we were able to catch up a fair bit, but much of the rest of my family were victims of one volatile “To-Do”… my plane ticket. I had reluctantly put off purchasing my plane ticket to Germany because my parents had graciously offered to gift some of their frequent flyer points to me, an offer that the cons of Procrastination never stood a chance at discouraging me from accepting.

Unfortunately, I, my mom, and my dad all lacked the necessary account information to make such a transaction, so we spent a good deal of time mixing up holding-time with increasingly more frantic explanations to the good people at Northwest Airlines’ 1-800 number. In the end it worked out, but the price I paid for booking my flight days before my intended departure was harsh; Instead of leaving on a Friday, I had to settle for Wednesday, and instead of flying direct, I was left with no other option but to connect from Detroit to Hartford to Amsterdam to Frankfurt.

New Mission: pack and arrange all travel accommodations in a day and a half. Yikes! I raced from the Nomad Bookhouse in downtown Jackson to pick up some books from my long hours to be spent en route, to St. Vincent de Paul’s to pick up some work slacks and shirts, to Gramer’s Chocolates on Waterloo to get some gifts for my hosts and friends that I would be meeting up with in Germany, only to come home receive gift cards to Elder Beerman’s from a mother who isn’t too keen on hearing that her son intends to wear thrift while overseas in fashion conscience Europe. Moms… aren’t they great?

Unfortunately, I still hadn’t packed. In fact I still needed to wash my clothes from Nicaragua. While my multiple loads of laundry passed through their spin cycles, I was graced by a last-night visit from my friend Mark; so much for sleeping. Mark and I covered a lot of ground, from dreams of grandeur and life plans to theology. By 4:00 or 5:00 in the morning of departure, I was back to folding my laundry and ready to start packing. By 8:00 AM, I figured I could lie down for a half hour, which inevitably turned into an hour. No worries, I recalled that my flight was to leave Detroit Metro at 12:40 or something like that. I can always sleep on the plane, I told myself.

Just as I finished the morning particulars, I decided to once again check my plane ticket. Yes, it’s still where I remember putting it, in my breast pocket. Departure time, 12:40? Departure time… Wait. Oh God, this can’t be right, I swear… 10:40? With heart beat gaining momentum, I quickly checked my watch. 9:17!

I burst into Monica’s room, who on the previous night offered to drive me to the airport, and awoke her from her sleep. This can’t be happening. I grabbed my bags and leaped down the stairs like I’m a contestant in the Gloucestershire Cheese Rolling race.Luckily, my dad walked in the front door as I tore through the family room. I don’t even know if I explained the full situation, but with one look, I knew that he understood. Four minutes later we already on the road, and I was already through a mental check of what I had forgotten in my scramble to get out of the door. All that I could come up with was my cell phone, which didn’t worry me too much, because I didn’t plan on making calls on it from Germany anyway, and besides, it didn’t work all too well. After trying to calculate the time that it would take to reach Detroit Metro and imploring my dad to drive faster, my list of left-behinds gained another member… the three 1-lb boxes of Dark Chocolate Turtles from Jackson’s very own Gramer’s Chocolates. Bummer, but still only a flesh wound. My hosts’ losses would just become my family's gain. After saying a clutch rosary with my dad, my heart rate started to settle down to a “dead at 45” obituary.

By the time we were driving through Ann Arbor, my flight was already boarding. I read on my boarding pass, for all International Flights present passport an hour previous to boarding. By the time we idled outside of McNamara Terminal, my watch read 10:15, at which I sincerely thanked my dad with a hug and made my way to the check-in Kiosk. As I hurriedly passed through Security and waited for the next Tram to my gate, I glanced yet again at my watch. 10:32. Although that had to be a record for airport security, I had only a few minutes until my plane took off!

As luck would have it, a guy next to me on the Tram was also on my flight to Hartford, and because of him and the fact that he was riding first class, I'm pretty sure the flight attendants kept the door open for just a bit longer than they usually would have. Without a minute to spare, I had made my flight. With a now obligingly descending heart rate, I succeeded in accomplishing at least one of my mental “To-Do” prompts without any complication. Sleep had never been so reassuring.