Jesus be a fence pilot.

I’m currently sitting on a plane en route to Dallas from Newark. Given my love of travel both domestic and international, I am not typically a nervous flier but let me tell you why this particular flight/flying day sucks.

Wake-up: For starters, I had to wake up at 5:15am on a Saturday. Being fair this is by choice but waking up on a weekend before my normal weekly wake up time is painful.

Parking: I was running a little late and forgot to print out my normal $6/day parking voucher, so I decided to park at the airport in Economy Parking Area 6. While it’s much more reasonable than regular short or long term parking, it does not allow you to jump on the AirTran (unbeknownst to me prior to driving there) and I had to wait for a bus to pick me and other passengers up and drop me and other passengers off at various terminals. For the amount of time it took, I could have parked offsite.

Security check-in: Nothing abnormal about the process but I was anxious as I was later than normal and my gate was set to begin boarding any second.

[Got through security and God threw me a Hail Mary by making my gate towards the beginning of my “wing”]

Delayed: Turns out all the huffing and puffing and sweat and breathlessness from the sprint I made I my gate was all for naught. My flight which was set to take off at 8:30am was leaving 15 mins later. Another Hail Mary because that extra 15 saved me from having to miss my boarding call and get my appropriate overhead space.

15 mins later….

…time changes on the board to 11am. Whaaaaa? The counter person comes on to tell us the plane has some dents in some part (all over my head) and that they are evaluating whether or not we can still fly on the aircraft (pending some repairs) or whether we’d be re-routed onto another aircraft. Given that it’s 9am and we’re now scheduled to take off 2 hours from now, we’re told to go on about out merry way but be back in an hour. Just in case.

Given my new found time, I went to grab some breakfast and when given my receipt I find out my order number is just about the worst effing number someone with shoddy nerves about issues with an aircraft they are about to board should receive. Actually, that is THE WORST order number period. Why does it even exist? They should do away with that number like they do away with the 13th floor at hotels. Even if I was order #yuckyuckyuck I shouldn’t have to see it. Can I get an Amen?

So after I received my breakfast sandwich and my death wish on a receipt, I walked back over to my gate only to be tortured with 6 different updates (yes, six) of changing departure times, gates, aircraft and everything in between.

The final verdict was a 10:30 departure from the original aircraft which the pilot announced upon boarding wasn’t actually fixed but was confirmed by the Brazilian parts company that it was safe for flying. Thanks pilot. How about TMI? I don’t need to know all that. How about let me ride my “fixed” aircraft in ignorance?

Flight and landing: First three quarters of the flight were glorious (aside from takeoff where my head felt like it was in a pressure cooker) and then 20 mins before we should have landed Chatty Pilot comes on to tell us that he’s leaving the fasten seat belt sign on and that everyone should remain seated as we’re hitting terrible headwinds. We were diverting the plane a bit and would have to cross over south of Dallas and then head back up north to avoid the massive cloud construction aka turbulence.

Well, this cloud construction was like riding on on a highway of potholes. Up. Down. Lean left. Nope, back straight. Take a dip right. Up. Down.

This is when I said a quick prayer and told God I was turning over my fear to him. Now, folks let me make this clear: I may cuss and have an adult beverage from time to time but this girl grew up in a typical Baptist church and will always call on the good Lord when I need him. And today, I needed him. And you know what happened when I was done with my quick prayer?

My brain gave me a reminder that I could distract myself with a nice vent right here.

And now that I am safely planted on the Dallas ground, I will regain the color in my face and hands and hit post.