I spent last week at the Cottonwood Ranch about a two-hour drive north of Wells, NV at a photography workshop. I struggled with whether to drive or fly. It’s about three and a half hours to Denver International Airport and about four and a half from Salt Lake Airport to the ranch. To drive from home would have taken almost 16 hours. In the end, it was the cost of gas versus the cost of the flight – the flight was much less than even one-way driving. Flying won.
In 2017 when I took John to Washington DC, I wrote a post about how I noticed that I wasn’t as anxious flying as I had always been. At that point, I was almost complete with my Gestalt training. (You can read that post here) Here’s another way my Gestalt training helped me when flying.
My flight left mid-afternoon on Saturday, and I returned late Friday – I would get into DIA around 9:30 pm. Or so I thought.
I was sharing a rental car with two other women and one of them had a 5:00 flight on Friday. No worries I can edit pictures while I wait. We got to SLC around 2:30 pm. Chris and I planned to have lunch together, but I had forgotten I couldn’t check in more than four hours before my flight which left at 8:00 pm. I had to wait until 4:00 pm to check my bag and go through security. So, I edited pictures until I could check in, had a nice dinner and glass of wine, and headed for my gate. I checked to see if I could get on the flight that left at 7:00 pm instead of waiting until 8:00 and was told it was full.
Back to my gate where I did a few things and took a little nap. I would be getting home late so I wanted all the rest I could get. When we boarded our plane, I got a decent seat and had a nice couple sit down next to me. We pushed back from the gate a few minutes early and then held on the tarmac for 15-30 minutes because Denver was backed up. It’s a short flight from SLC to DIA and I tried to sleep to no avail.
Then the pilot came on. He said there was a storm in Denver and the airport was backed up. We might be diverted to Colorado Springs or go back to Salt Lake City. For now, we were going to circle and see where we needed to go. After about three circles he came back on the PA system and said the storm was too bad in Denver – funnel clouds and such – the airport was closed. Colorado Springs had filled up and we would be going back to SLC to refuel and try again.
When we got back to SLC we didn’t go to the terminal instead we went to a fueling area. That’s when it happened. Someone wanted off the plane. I don’t understand why someone would decide that they didn’t want to finish their travel plans with a short delay, but they did. The pilot came on and said because they had to get transportation for departing passengers and refigure the manifest it would take about an hour. Then someone else wanted off, another delay. Then someone else. There was a woman across the aisle from us who was very upset about this and let the entire plane know.
Finally, it was decided to take us back to the terminal, and deplane everyone, those that wanted to stay in Salt Lake City could, and those who wanted to go back to Denver would rescan their boarding passes, so they had an accurate manifest, and get back on the plane. This was done quickly. We got back on the plane and departed for Denver. By the time I got to Denver, I had been on the plane for seven hours. The original flight time was one and a half hours.
I could have gotten upset with this delay. I could have caused a scene. Instead, I chose to treat it as an adventure. Was it frustrating – you bet? Was there anything I could do about the weather in Denver and the airport being closed – no? To get terribly upset would have only made things worse and increased my stress level which wouldn’t have helped. I did manage to sleep on the really late flight and fortunately, when we got to Denver our bags came off the airplane quickly. I heard that another flight had been waiting for hours.
I got in my Jeep and headed east. I made it home a little over 24 hours after I left the ranch with two stops to nap and eat breakfast.
Do you have trouble with last-minute changes in plans? Do you get overly anxious when things don’t go the way you expected? Come see how the horses and I can help. Connect with me here to learn more.
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Onward!
