My Long List of Apologies

We've just completed yet another torturous overseas plane trip. We left Honolulu at 8 p.m. one day, and finally arrived in Birmingham at 8 p.m. the next. Subtracting the five-hour time difference, that's NINETEEN hours of riding in and waiting for airplanes.

It was a pretty difficult trip for all of us.

(image from http://highsierraspotters.com)

So I'd like to send an open letter of apology to the following people:

1. To the stranger seated beside Little Girl and me on the plane from Honolulu: I'm sorry my child kept leaning on you when she fell asleep. And that she peed her seat.

2. To the people who got flashed: I'm sorry I forgot to pack clean underwear and my five-year old had to "go commando" after the seat-wetting incident.

3. To everyone seated near the cabin bathroom: I'm sorry for my daughter's ear-piercing, blood-curdling shrieks when she pinched her finger in the folding door. I took her inside the cubicle as quckly as I could, but I know you could probably still hear her. (I think even the birds flying nearby were cringing at the noise.)

4. To the people stuck standing up and sitting on the floor in the waiting area at the Seattle airport: I'm sorry my family took up all the chairs. In our defense, they really should have installed more than seven.

5. To the security team in the Seattle airport: I'm sorry we looked so suspicious. Or for whatever thing we did that made you swarm the area we were occupying with about twenty agents and a couple of bomb dogs.

6. To the odd-looking possible cross-dresser seated next to my teenage daughter: I'm sorry she thought you were an undercover agent. I think she was just still freaked out by the uber-security scan at the airport.

7. To the passengers on the last leg of the trip: I'm sorry I couldn't muster enough energy to properly reprimand the twins when they started that "Who can yell the word 'poopy' the loudest?" contest. I really tried,but I kept nodding off. (You know you're tired when you can sleep through a screaming contest.)

And, last but not least:

8. To my husband: I'm sorry I was so grouchy. I started out pleasant; I really did. It's just that the lack of sleep made all the nice leak out of me. I noticed that it seemed to work that way for you as well.

Anyways, I'm glad that's all over.

Until it's time to go back....