Worst.Airline.Experience.Ever = Worst.Birthday.Ever

Recently, I turned 30.  For a birthday celebration, my mom and I planned a wonderful girls' trip to one of my favorite places: New York City.  We spent the night in Atlanta and were planning to fly up to New York the morning of my birthday (a direct flight, leaving at 10:45 AM and arriving at 1:00 PM) and spend the remainder of the day walking around New York and having a special birthday dinner that night.

Here is what actually happened:

• 10:15 AM-People start lining up toward a nearby gate/Delta counter; no announcement made...did they change our gate again?  What is going on?
• 10:20 AM-Buzz among the other passengers is that our flight has been cancelled and we all now have to wait to speak to an agent and rebook.
• 11:00 AM-We finally talk to an agent who tell us he can put us on a flight via Dulles airport/D.C. and arrive in NYC at 4 PM.  We're not excited about losing those 3 hours, but we'll take it and make the best of it.
• 1:30 PM-We arrive in Dulles and plan to take our next flight at 2:30.
• 2:00 PM-Our flight to NYC is delayed...and delayed...and delayed...
• 5:30 PM-We FINALLY board our plane to NYC, and it's a small commuter plane (2 x1).  We sit at the gate for 30 mins and finally push back to the tarmac.
• 6:00 PM-We sit on the tarmac and watch jet plane after jet plane take off, but air traffic control says there is too much traffic or something, and our small plane has to wait.  
• 7:30 PM-Pilot says it doesn't look good.  By this point, I cannot control the tears.
• 8:00 PM-Pilot regretfully informs us that they have had to cancel our flight and we are returning to the terminal.
• 8:30 PM-At the Delta counter once again, we find out that that was the last flight of the day to NYC.  We rebook for the earliest flight possible the next day and are told Delta will not even pay for our hotel.  We get a $10 meal voucher each, probably only because I tearfully told them it was my birthday.
• 9:00 PM-At baggage claim, we discover our bags are already in LaGuardia.  They got put on the 11:45 flight from Atlanta even though we didn't.  Talk about adding insult to injury.
• 10:00 PM-We arrive at an airport hotel discouraged and exhausted.  We order dinner from the hotel bar (the restaurant has already closed) and then head upstairs to our room.  We take showers and try to sleep but are mostly unsuccessful.
• 4:30 AM-Time to get up and catch the 5 AM shuttle to the airport.
• 5:30 AM-Check in at the airport and spend my meal voucher on breakfast at Starbucks.
• 6:15 AM-We board our 6:30 flight which leaves about 7:00 AM.
• 8:00 AM-We finally make it LaGuardia...praise God!!! Only 19 hours later than scheduled.

Left: 3:00 PM, enjoying a chai latte and still hopeful
Right: 6:00 AM the next day, pathetic and desperate (notice the Venti chai)

As an experienced traveler, I know that part of this comes with the territory.  I've had some pretty bad travel experiences including throwing up on a train in Spain and having to spend the night alone in a Mexico City airport hotel after returning from my grandmother's funeral.  However, this is the 2nd-worse travel experience I have ever had in my life.  (The only thing worse was when I threw up 25 times in one day in Peru and had to ride in a car several more hours after that.)  Thanks, Delta, for ruining my 30th birthday and having me spend the entire day in airports, airplanes, or airport hotels.

After awhile though, conviction sets in.  Of course I know that this is a first-world problem.  I know that many people would love to spend the day in an airport where they had access to clean water and bathrooms all day long.  On an even deeper level, I wrestle with the theological issue.  If I believe that God is sovereign, then I have to believe that He is still sovereign over everything that went wrong that day.  He could have chosen to have it go differently, but He didn't.  Sometimes, the Lord gives us a glimpse of things from His perspective, like the woman on our plane who was supposed to be in the World Trade Center on Sept. 11th but wasn't.  Other times, we don't know why things go the way they do.  Did this terrible travel day happen to prevent us from a dangerous accident, to teach me about how much I still struggle with the sin of entitlement, or did it not have anything to do with us at all?  Any one of these is possible, and ultimately all that matters is that God is God and I am not.  Oh Lord, continue to teach me that Your thoughts are not my thoughts and Your ways are not my ways...

God is still loving and sovereign even when the story does not have a happy ending.  

Much to my delight though, this story does have a happy ending...from the moment we made it to New York, we had a fabulous time full of blessings we don't deserve but so appreciated and enjoyed.  More details and pics to come in the next blog post!