I had a fun travel post ready for today, but I couldn’t
bring myself to post it. Yesterday was a hard day. A rip-my-hair-out type of
day. Thankfully, it wasn’t anything huge or major. It’s just that all of these crazy situations popped up this
week that made me feel like I’m about to lose it. A few minutes before I left work, a fly flew into my ear,
and I burst out laughing because it was such a great indication of how my day
went.
Here’s the thing: I am good at making multiple small
problems ruin something really great. Recently,
a friend told me that she had asked someone who had just returned from St.
Petersburg, Russia how she enjoyed her trip. This person replied that she hated
it because she had to sit on a cold bench one time. She let that one tiny
moment ruin her entire experience.
I had a cold bench moment today: my JetBlue flight to Boston
was cancelled, along with four other flights that day. There was only one
option left. Instead of getting there at 11 a.m., the new flight would get us
there at 11 p.m. It was going to be our only day in Boston, I was meeting a
friend there, and to top it all off, I had to pay even more than usual for a
hotel that day because there is a 10,000 person convention in Boston that
weekend, and I wouldn’t get to enjoy the city.
When I heard this, I was ready to throw in the towel. I started looking into how much of the
trip we could refund. We had already had to pay a change fee to get the flight
we wanted in the first place, and then they completely changed it for us. I
thought that with this cold bench, I couldn’t enjoy my trip.
Long story short is that we were able to change airlines,
but we had to pay even more money to do it. It wasn’t close to an ideal outcome,
but it was the only option we had. Our trip is special for so many reasons: we
are celebrating our fifth anniversary (way late) and want to enjoy a week
together before Chris flies all over the country for interviews. I could let
this cold bench ruin our entire time together right now…or I could just find a
warmer bench to sit on and enjoy our vacation.
