After more than 6 months traveling, this little story sums up my state of mind.

I am the lucky occupant of a cigarette-smelling room at the Motel 6. It is freezing because of the air-conditioning. It is across the street from the Rochester airport and I can hear the planes as they land. This was not supposed to happen. I am not supposed to be here. I should be driving my car, which is in long-term parking, to my family cottage on Lake Ontario and then home to California. But, alas, that is not what fate had in store for this unlucky traveler.

My day began at around 8:00 a.m. in the San Francisco airport. The Monday crowd was especially large and the United self check in line reached farther than I want to remember. This is pretty much when the day began to suck.

First I waited in line to check my bags. Then, as the time ticked away, I decided not to check my bags. So, I walked to a ticket consol for people with carry-on luggage. But, of course, the computer proceeded to not work. Then a black phone on the wall began to ring. I picked it up and a female voice guided me through the process of getting a boarding pass. A boarding pass came out of the console.

My next hurdle was security. I had no place to put my knife, which I usually put in my checked bag. So, I went through with it, hoping they’d not notice. But they noticed it, and then they noticed my canteen full of water. I was told, by one of the two ladies searching my bags, rubbing everything inside with explosive detector fabric, that I couldn’t drink or pour out my canteen. They would have to keep it and my knife. I could go outside, pour out my water, mail myself my knife, and then come back through, I was told. But then I would miss my plane. So I left it all.

I just made the flight. When I finally sat down in my seat, I took a well-deserved sigh of relief.

Usually I take all this kind of thing in stride. I go slowly through the motions that, point by point, seem to push most travelers over the edge. I take off my boots and belt and hat and throw all my change and my cell phone and my computer and my chap stick in a plastic container. None of this bothers me. I walk through the metal detector and the new blower machine and still, no problem. And, although this time I was growing close to screaming FUCK! when they took my knife and then also my canteen, I held back.

But then, sitting in that airplane, looking through my bag, my hand jingled my car keys. I pulled them out to put them in my pocket. I looked at them. They did not look right. They were too few, to light… to missing my fucking car keys! As the plane lifted off, I searched and found nothing in my pockets or anywhere else. And then I had a minor freak out. You know the quit ‘FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCK!’ you say to yourself.

You can imagine how the rest of my lay over in Boston, and the subsequent flight to Rochester, went.  But that was not the end of my woes.  Once in Rochester, what to do? I thought, well, it’s not that bad. I can rent a car and drive to the cottage. But no, no, no, I have the luck to arrive when some god-forsaken festival is going on and every single rental car agency is out of cars. There were, like, ten.

So I sat and thought. Then I searched my bag again. Then I went back to the rental car places and asked if they might just have one car for me, just one. On my third try I actually got one. The women behind the desk asked for my license, which I handed over and then a credit card. I gave her my debit card. I would be sleeping in the cottage in an hour. But then, then she said I needed a major credit card or a return ticket. “I don’t have a return flight,” I said. “I am driving my car across the country.”

“Sorry,” she said. I wanted to cry.

There I was back at square one, or what ever square I was at, and it was like 11:30 at night and I was at a loss. What to do? What to do? Maybe I could break into my car and hot wire the thing. That didn’t sound like the best bet. So I thought, just go to a motel and come back tomorrow with a locksmith. That doesn’t sound so bad.

 At the cabstand, outside, I was told it would cost ten dollars to drive me to the Motel 6, just across the road. When the cab pulled up I asked if he might be wiling to bargain. How bought seven bucks?  He just looked at me like I was a cretin and said, “I waited an hour to take you across the street and now your complaining.” Then the he made to shut his truck. “Ten is fine,” I said and he drove me to the motel 6 for ten dollars. 

Oh the joys of travel.