Here I Am in Sweden

     If my mother were alive and heard the following story, she would shake her head and say, as I heard her say many times during my life, "It's a good thing the good Lord is looking after you," to which I might say, "Maybe he could do a little better job."

      The first thing he could have done was warn me that my itinerary for getting to Gothenburg, Sweden, where I would visit friends before flying to Marseille, France, to meet Mike for our hike on Corsica, wasn't very smart. I had bought a cheap ticket to Seattle, which sounded smart except that it was unconnected to the flight I booked from Seattle to Gothenburg on a different airline. When I thought it through, I realized that because the flights weren't connected, I would have to go to baggage claim in Seattle to pick up my checked luggage (my backpack for the hike) and then go through security again to catch the plane to Gothenburg. That would be a drag, but if everything went smoothly, I had time to do it.

       My flight to Seattle left Medford on Tuesday morning at 5:45. At 3:45 a.m. Mike drove me to the airport, in my car, which I would leave at his house while I was gone. He had said something earlier that maybe after leaving me at the airport he would hike up Table Rock, our usual Tuesday morning routine, this time in the moonlight, but now he thought it was a better idea to go home and try to get some sleep. We parted at the airport with a cheerful, "See you in Marseille!" and I took my suitcase, my day pack, and my backpack to the Delta Airlines counter, where I got a boarding pass to Seattle and put my checked-luggage backpack on the conveyer belt. Then I went to the Alaska Airlines counter for the other boarding passes. 

       That's where things went wrong. The man at the Alaska Airlines counter asked, of course, for my passport, which, proud of having remembered both to get it renewed and to have brought it with me, I handed to him. He looked at it and said, politely, "Do you have a current passport? This one is expired."

       Panic fluttered its familiar wings, though if I had been following my mother's way of thinking, irritation might have been more appropriate. If the good Lord really were looking after me, why didn't he make sure I picked up the right passport when I left home? It would take me an hour to drive home for my passport, then another hour back to the airport. I would miss my flight. I called Mike to ask him to pick me up, but he didn't answer the phone. I rushed back to the Delta desk to book another flight to Seattle. Immediately the agent called baggage to get my backpack returned before it got put on the plane, then told me the only other Delta flight to Seattle left at 6:00 a.m. I would miss that flight, too. I called Mike. Still no answer. I rushed back to Alaska Airlines to see if they had a flight I could take. I would have to buy another ticket, but at this point the extra cost was the least of my worries. There was a flight that left at 10:00 a.m. It had one seat left. The agent said she would hold it for me until I returned with my passport.

       I had been calling Mike every few minutes. "Mike, call me." "Mike, I need you to come get me." "Mike. Pick up the phone!" (I was thinking, "Pick up the damn phone," but I don't think I actually said it.) I grabbed a taxi and headed for his house. On the way it occurred to me that maybe the reason he wasn't answering his phone was that he had decided to hike up Table Rock, after all, and that in that case he would have the keys to my car in his pocket. Maybe I could get a (very expensive) taxi to my house – except, as it now occurred to me, my house key was with the car key, and I had dropped the spare house key in my neighbor's locked mailbox when I left home. The whole journey was disintegrating in front of me.

       Then the good Lord thought the joke had gone far enough and took pity on me. My car was sitting in front of Mike's house. I pounded on the door, waking Mike up. He drove me home, I picked up the right passport, and we drove to the airport, where I made effusive thanks to him as we parted. I picked up my backpack from the Delta counter, showed the renewed passport to the ticket agent, who accommodated me by making out boarding passes for all legs of the journey: Medford-Seattle, Seattle-Portland, Portland-Frankfurt, Frankfurt-Gethenburg. He checked my backpack all the way to Gothenburg. 

       I had three hours before departure. I took a long, calming walk down the street and around the block, rolling my suitcase behind me. Then I sat at the gate and knitted until boarding time.

       The rest of the journey was long but, thank goodness, without further distress. I arrived in Gothenburg the next day at 6:45 p.m. My friend Lasse met me at the airport, and here I am in Sweden, where the weather is fine and the roses just starting to bloom.