"Yesterday All My Troubles Seem So Faraway"  The Beatles

I woke up at 3 am in Pensacola Beach, FL in a townhouse on the Gulf of Mexico.  My parents and I had planned my early morning flight back to Chicago all week while we basked under the sun on white sands and shopped and eat.  I enjoyed the double chocolate dipped sugar cones with a scoop of peach yogurt while my sister and mother shopped for gifts for friends.

Evaluations were habitual sometimes unnoticed yet folded neatly in authorities pockets.  Daily fissures clean and sutured.  Wounds unmeasured and finally left unfeathered.  The unclosed wounds that last until the night, into the daylight, and through the light.  A healing tree of giving, a tree living freely, ever so freely.

The morning was dark and I hadn't had much sleep sleeping in the front room near the balcony windows to look out unto the ocean as I did each morning during our stay.  My mom helped me pack my bag, my dad got the car ready and we headed out to make a long story short.  I cleaned out my purse of all liquids which are not allowed on planes, I had my drivers license, and one carry on bag.

The airport is very small on Pensacola Beach FL and my mom printed out my flight information at the kiosk inside with me.  I am usually one to want to do things on my own and call if I have any questions so the help of my parents felt very intense especially at 4am.  We saw fishers along our way to the airport, and there was a good feeling that brushed up against me when I left the island as if that was the islands way of saying good bye and thanks from coming.

My plane was to leave at 6am.  I haven't been to an airport in a while and didn't know what the heck I was doing.  After my parents left me, I didn't say good bye to my dad when he said good bye and didn't really see my mom leave either.  I went into a shop that was open and viewed all the books and magazines.  I bought a hat that said Pensacola on it and went into the next shop for a cup of joe.

It was a very good cup of joe and the girl put hazelnut into the cup.  She did something out of the ordinary and I caught it.  She was going to change the cup entirely just to add hazelnut flavoring.  When I asked her why she had to do that she asked if I needed to add room for cream and sugar.  Fuzzy and groggily I noticed I wasn't my chipper self and grunted no its fine.

Here is an important detail:  I walked to the check in point after purchasing my coffee and the man on post said no drinks after this point.  I felt that coming.  I then decided to just go back into the coffee shop and finish the cup of coffee there.  I had an hour before take off.  Before that though, the customer in line behind me felt to close for comfort.  And I couldn't get a thank you out of me I was so compromised by time, the flight, and coffee which tasted delicious. Feeling a little wrong for not throwing out the cup of joe and just going to my gate number and wait for boarding, I took my coffee and sat down to read from the NT.  I noticed my reading was clear as day and I was feeling consumed by the scriptures.  I still kept my eyes on the clock and at twenty minutes to boarding I got up and went to check in my bag and pass through security.

The clock was ticking,  mom texted me to get moving.  She said you have five minutes to get on that plane and I was still in the coffee shop.  I really don't even want to write this feeling the pressure that rocks are going to get thrown at my head for my choices here.  It gets better.  Ten minutes later I decide to go and check in after she told me five minutes.  I hear them call my name twice with two other names that boarding is starting.

Assuming I'd whiz right through check in, they stop my finding a cork screw opener that I didn't see sooner in my side pocket in my purse.  I told them I was going to be late.  I needed to hurry.  I felt my head going but my body just standing in one place.  I knew they wouldn't care that I missed my flight and so I just smiled and waited while my brain was racing ahead of me.

I ran fast as soon as they let me go to the gate and everything was closed up.  I was mortified.  It was 6am and the plan had taken off ten minutes ago. There was an 11am flight coming that was over crowded and they put me on standby.  From 6a to 10a I shopped around looking at books and magazines and ate fish and chips.  My head was foggy and I was frazzled from being alone and missing my flight at 6am.

Dad gave me $50.00 and half was spent already on souvenirs and food.  I tried to pray and nothing was coming out of me.  I couldn't relax.  I couldn't sleep.  I was the only one at the gate until 9am and so I read further in the NT in the KJV.  It was so clear the message, and I really knew the holy ghost was with me.  I could hear the airline lady at her computer chipper and sharp talking to guests around 9am to 10 am.

I began to get squirrely maybe mousey, when I thought I seen someone I knew and it wasn't them, a young couple.  I thought the man was my sisters friends brother.  Clearly it wasn't and it was too late to keep walking when he noticed that I noticed him and thats why I hid.  Mostly because I became intimidated by the woman he was with and I would most of my male friends girl friends.  My brain wouldn't turn off. She started coming closer to me and I couldn't find my center fast enough and she had to step over my bag because I didn't move it for her because I was so distracted by chaos and panic.

Yet i moved it earlier for her partner to pardon myself away from these strangers. Couples are weird sometimes.  They just move like electric eels ready to zap you kindly yet with a sting.  I began to hide behind the book stands from them because I didn't want to scare them and yet they were just getting closer and closer to me.  Conversations started to work my nerves and I couldn't even sit down when I felt I was being summoned by young gentleman eating their meals around me so I started playing musical chairs all around the food stop.

I could barely sit down before 10am came along and my moms texts were out of control.  I was falling asleep on my food so I just got up and went and ate on the computer desk and waited for the airline stewardess.  She never came on time so I moved to another table to sit down and finish my fish and chips.

Conversations around me grew louder and so I called my Aunt Elida and told her everything that was going on.  I went back to sit down and waited.  I got up and used the bathroom. I finally got my standby seat after I went to sit down and read some more around a crowd of senior citizens.  I thought for sure for this reason our plane would go down but then I heard the cooing of a baby.

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