“Stranded”
Gentle warning to readers: long wait ahead. Here is something to read while you wait:
Twenty years ago, Tom Hanks starred in the movie Terminal as Viktor Navorski. After flying into JFK airport, the Eastern European man, denied admission to the US and unable to return to his homeland, is stranded in the JFK terminal for nine months. Below is the timeline and journal notes from my recent starring role in Terminal - Dallas Fort Worth Airport edition.
Saturday, April 20, 2024
11:09 am Text message: American Airlines 510 from PHX to DFW departure time has changed to 3:36 PM on Apr 20 from gate B8 in terminal 4.
2:18 pm Text message: American Airlines 510 from PHX to DFW departure time has changed to 4:08 PM on Apr 20 from gate B8 in terminal 4.
8:20 pm American Airlines 510 to DFW from PHX, though delayed two hours, has landed and is taxiing toward the terminal. My flight home to Columbia leaves at 8:50 pm. From where I am seated (row 8), I convince myself I can deboard quickly, scamper to the gate for the Columbia flight, and make it just in time.
8:25 pm The plane stops taxiing. The pilot tells us that a day of unabated thunderstorms in Dallas – Fort Worth led to the cancellation or delay of 825 flights and a backlog of incoming flights now seeking a gate. Our estimated wait for a gate is 87 minutes. 150 people in a 737 groan in unison.
8:49 pm I text my colleagues in ministry and my wife:
“Terry, John, Jennie, It looks to me I will not be able to get home tonight. Due to weather in Dallas, my flight out of Phoenix was delayed by two hours. We arrived in Dallas with a slight window for me to catch my flight to Columbia, but now we are sitting on the tarmac without a gate. It looks bleak. I will let you know for sure what my plans are once we get off the plane. Terry, I'm aching because I wanted to hear you tomorrow. I will have to listen via video.”
John: “Peace brother. Be safe and rest in the shuffle that is beyond your control. Thanks for letting us know.”
Terry: “Oh my, David. So sorry for this! We've got you covered, friend. Stay safe and breathe easy. We're in the journey with you!”
Jennie: “So grateful for this team.”
Me, too.
9:00 pm The woman next to me asks, “What do you do for a living?” Any pastor will tell you that when a stranger asks you what we do, we pause. Telling someone you are pastor opens the door to all kinds of responses and lines of inquiry including:
Yawning indifference (A preacher – Boring!)
Mild terror (A preacher – Oh no!)
Thinly veiled revulsion (A preacher – Yuck!)
Apologetic confession (“I went to church when I was little, but I haven’t been for a long time.”)
Unapologetic confession running the gamut from polite (“I’m spiritual, but not religious”) to impolite (harangues on the hypocrisy/arrogance/exclusivity/judgmentalism/ insincerity/ All-they-do-is-talk-about-money mentality of pastors/preachers/priests in particular and Christians in general).
Testimony (“I was saved when I was eight years old...”)
Put-you-on-the-spot questions (“What do you believe about...?” “Why does God...?” “What does it mean when the Bible says...?”)
Curiosity (“Tell me about your call.”)
A request (“Would you please pray for...? Which I do. Then and there.)
When I respond, “I’m a pastor,” the woman elbows her husband in the window seat, slaps her thigh and says, “I knew you were a pastor!” Huh? I am wearing jeans, a white golf shirt with a Turtle Run Golf Course logo (one of my brother’s discards), and a three-day growth of whiskers. What gave me away? She didn’t say and I didn’t ask. What she did say was that she and her husband were members of a small Church of the Nazarene congregation in Richardson, TX, they had a guest room I was welcome to spend the night in, and what did I think about CS Lewis? I politely declined the hospitality, enthusiastically endorsed Lewis, and thoroughly enjoyed the next 45 minutes of conversation with two people my age with an evident love for their small-and-getting-smaller congregation and wondering what they could do to reverse the decline.
9:45 pm Our conversation is interrupted by the captain telling us we will be parked on the tarmac for another hour … at least. Whereupon a youngish guy (When you’re 64+, youngish is 40 or so) in First Class a half dozen rows in front of me yells, “Liar!” and begins to repeatedly stab his finger toward a flight attendant who is commencing beverage service. Two other attendants come alongside and deescalate the guy’s tantrum. When another flight attendant comes from the rear of the plane to where the Richardson Nazarenes and I are seated, opens the overhead bin, removes a blue bag, unzips it and takes out plastic zip ties, I size up whether I’ll be needed to restrain the guy and how I’ll do it, if necessary. Thankfully, the guy settled down, so I wasn’t summoned to rodeo steer wrestling duty on the tarmac of the Big D.
11:00 pm We reach our gate after 2 hours and 40 minutes on the tarmac. Those of us who missed connecting flights are told where to go to reschedule. The good news is that it is a desk near our gate. The bad news is there are three beleaguered airline staff trying to make new connections for over 150 people.
Midnight I have been in line to get a new ticket for an hour and there are still 50 people ahead of me. What to do while waiting? I google “waiting in line” and find:
Americans spend roughly 37 billion hours each year waiting in line.
People are becoming less patient. A 2015 Microsoft study found that the average human attention span clocked in at 8 seconds – a full second shorter than that of a goldfish. Technology is teaching us to expect instant gratification, but the world rarely works that way. I can report that airport lines do not work that way. Though most are patient, one man at the ticket counter is raising a ruckus akin to the guy in First Class. I don’t need to prepare myself for steer wrangling, though – an airport policeman is already there. Add to the jobs I could not do: Help desk at airport. Also on that list: public school superintendent, return desk at Wal-Mart, proctologist, dental hygienist, high-rise window washer.
12:30 am Still in line. I google “compensation for cancelled flights” and find:
“If your flight delay or cancellation is the result of something that is out of the control of American Airlines, like the weather, you are responsible for your own hotel, transportation and meal expenses.” I figured as much.
“Act of God, you lose.” Short and to the point.
1:15 am After two hours and fifteen minutes, I am ticketed on a flight to Columbia at 4 pm and on standby at 10:30 am.
2:00 am I haven’t eaten since brunch 14 hours ago. Nothing is open. I overhear a policeman tell a woman that the 7-Eleven next to gate E 13 is open all night. I find it, enter, and a clerk looking to be from the Horn of Africa (Ethiopia? Somalia?) smiles and says, “Good morning, sir.” (Observation: the majority of night shift workers in the airport look to be immigrants. I make it a point to smile at them. They smile in return.) I smile and say, “Good morning to you, sir.” A Central American woman (Honduras? El Salvador?) is cleaning the hot dog roller grill, so I get a a half dozen mini cinnamon donuts and a coffee (caffeine has no effect on me). Dinner.
3:00 am All the best places to sleep have been claimed by stranded travelers. Bodies covered in coats and blankets stretch across couches and benches. The rest of us are relegated to individual seats in the gate areas. At E 11, a woman six seats down from me is snoring loudly. I relocate to E 8, but a guy two rows behind me is sawing logs. At E 4, I lay down on the floor at the base of the windows looking out onto the tarmac and fall asleep for 30 minutes, awakened by yet someone else’s snoring.
4:00 am. People are starting to come through security for flights that leave at 5:30 am.
4:30 am I head for Sky Train for Terminal B. As I am going up the escalator, two (Portuguese? Brazilian?) women ask me if I know how to get to Terminal A. I tell them I’ll let them know when to get off. When I nod at their stop, they say as they exit, “Have a nice trip.” If they only knew.
5-6 am Fall asleep in a chair at B 17.
6-6:45 am Breakfast at McDonald’s.
7 - 9:30 am I pass the hours reading and walking up and down the terminal. The handle on my suitcase is broken. As I pull it behind me, the handle pops out and the suitcase falls to the ground. As I stop and squat to pick up the bag and stick the handle back in, the people behind me flow around me to the left and right – dodging the 6’4” obstruction in the way to their gate. If they had horns, they’d be honking.
9:20 am I arrive at B 36 for the standby flight. Lotta people. My hopes fade.
9:30 am Announcement: the flight has been delayed an hour and a half due to maintenance issues. Sheesh.
10:00 am. Announcement: the gate for the Columbia flight has been changed from B 36 to B 2. The ½ mile trek from one end of the terminal to the other provides many opportunities for the broken handle to pop out and the bag to fall to the ground. Pop, fall, squat, insert handle, arise, proceed 50 ft, pop, fall, squat… Over and over.
10:15 am Arrive at B 2. Announcement: “Standby passenger Shirey, please come to the ticket counter.” I pop up out of my seat, take a step forward, and the handle pops out of the suitcase.
12:30 pm Touch down in Columbia. An open gate is awaiting us. When I turn on my phone, a text message from Jennie: “In the parking lot. Text me when you’re coming out. Sorry about the long night, but you have plenty of fodder for your next newsletter column.”
I head for the exit.
Handle pops out of suitcase.
