One little word captured

March 1, 2011

This week my word Challenge was used over and over again. I knew it was coming too, I knew the second I booked the flight to Florida that there was going to be a challenge ahead. I just didn't know how challenging it was going to be.

You see I'm not a HUGE fan of flying, in fact my last flight was in 2006 so its been a while... But being a "runner" now and learning about the Disney Princess half marathon last year when it fell on Chelsea's birthday, I knew it was something I would have to prepare myself for.

This year they moved the marathon to the week before Chelsea's birthday, but with the choice of Vegas or Disney for her 21st birthday she chose Disney and running.

I knew I would be better flying with my daughter but also knew it would still be a challenge and oh how we were challenged. Part of our challenge, a snow storm... a nasty snow storm which ended up leaving upwards of 12" of snow...

on our way to the airport. at this point our flight had not been cancelled

We arrived at the airport and found our flight had been delayed 15 minutes, then the next update our flight had been delayed until 1:50 (from 11:15). My nerves were kicking in as I thought not only do I fear flying, but add to it deicing the plane and horrible snow storm with high winds... nice

But then what could be worse than flying out in this blizzard? The flight got totally cancelled... I almost started to cry... all these plans for months, down the drain? As we waited in line luckily we didn't know that these people were all booking into the last flight that they hadn't cancelled. So now my fear of flying went into my fear of not getting there at all...

Finally we got to a ticket agent and while he wasn't the nicest man. In fact he wasn't pleasant AT ALL we got our flight changed to the early one that while delayed was still scheduled to go. Although when confirming our original flight the day before my sweet husband told me to upgrade to 1st class to help my nerves - Next challenge...

The plane is full first class is out of the question and I cannot get you two seats together... here I am again holding back the tears since that was my one saving grace, sitting with my daughter....

We then unknowingly had hours to kill as they would delay further and further into the day. We were glad to get on the flight but now just wondered when we would even get to Florida? We spent the morning and afternoon chatting with other stranded passengers who were also on our flight, one couple that was going to watch their daughter run in the race. And in the "small world" conversations we had we found that they knew Ben from Lutheran West, the wife worked with one of Chelsea's sisters in her sorority as we talked about college amongst other things.

Finally at 3pm they started loading the plane, and ahh yes the nerves kicked in again! Chelsea went first and then by the time I got on we stared around the plane at the rest of the groups of couples that of course were not going to split up so the two of us could sit together. Finally a man said I don't care where I sit, as long as its and aisle and switched with me. And while it didn't get me next to Chel, it got me right in front of her and that was better than where I was!

As we sat on the plane awaiting instruction we began talking with others around us who as we found out were also heading to Disney to run the princess half marathon! We laughed and joked with all the people around us, and sitting next to me was a young boy (2nd grade) and his mom. Now I knew I had to keep my fears at bay as not to upset this boy.

Our captain kept us up to speed on what was going on... the winds now were the problem as one plane tried to take off and the captain of that plane was not comfortable with it. So after a while they unloaded our plane again for another delay.

Just as I would get myself ready for flight, something else would change...

We had to get off the plane and wait again, wait until these winds died down, and flying conditions would get better.

those shapes in the distance are the plow trucks trying to keep the runway cleared

Once they did finally announce we were going to take off and had to re-board the plane we now had to do so alphabetically and have out our license since they had already scanned our tickets. We joked with others and they found out our last name and knew we were going to be the last to board... well almost last. There was one guy thats last name was Zi - so he took the last place spot! We later referred to him as "Z" when we past him in the Orlando airport as he smiled walking by.

Once it was time to taxi out and deice the plane my nerves were beginning to show themselves again. I reached back and grabbed Chelsea's hand as we took off down the runway. We held onto one another the entire time until we reached our cruising altitude of 33,000 feet. (thanks captain, but something I didn't need to know) tears slowly streamed down the side of my face as I couldn't be more happy than to be doing this with my daughter. And once we were up, the entire plane CHEERED!

And now finally we were on our way to Florida, on our way to the original challenge... the race!