Finite-Eternity.com is a personal site that I have owned for many, many years. Currently I am trying to decide what I want to do with it moving forward. I don't really have any content I want to share on it at the moment, but I may in the future. Even if I don't use the website actively I like still holding on to it. While I contemplate my current plans for the site, please enjoy this true story I wrote a while back about a trip I took to a wedding between two of my friends.

The Journey of Adventure

The Internet has been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. I can trace my history back to the days of AOL, Prodigy and Compuserve. Those were the days when “webdesign” was a loose term, at best, and Geocities was the place where all the cool kids had their personal pages dedicated to whatever was hot at the moment. The years passed and the Internet evolved to be a home to more sophisticated webpages which played hosts to actual communities of like-minded individuals (for better or worse), and media in the form of games and music started to emerge as legitimate enterprises. It is difficult now to imagine a time when the World of Warcraft did not exist as a household name, and any of a million movies are available to watch within minutes of thinking about it, but those days did exist.

As a child of the Internet, and an introvert no less, it is thus natural that I made acquaintances over the Internet. In particular, my time in an early multiplayer game called Final Fantasy XI (somehow still alive and active, though I am no longer a part of it) resulted in numerous friendships that have spanned near a decade now. It is hard to recall precisely when I met Chad and Jessica in the vast lands of Vana’diel, but a friendship formed which has resulted most recently in one of the strangest trips I have ever taken.

Chad and Jessica decided (not entirely by their own choice) to have their wedding in July of 2014. I say “have their wedding” and not “get married” because they were, in fact, already wed the previous year. This is not the proper way to do things™, apparently (perhaps it should be, though), and thus the requisite wedding festivities were planned. So, out of a sense of small obligation I received an invite to said wedding. And, out of a similar sense of small obligation, I agreed to attend.

For a while I waffled between flying to the wedding, and driving. Ultimately the convenience of flying won out again the 12 hour drive to get to the Maine wedding. There was still a 4 hour drive from Massachusetts (where I flew into) to the wedding, but I believed this would be a better alternative in the end. I no longer necessarily believe that is true.

The first omen that things were unwell occurred a day before my flight was scheduled to depart for more northern climes. As I gathered my suitcase from the back of my closet (I rarely use my suitcase as I prefer to bring everything as a carry-on, but for a wedding where I would have formal clothes this did not seem appropriate) I heard a cascade of what sounded like broken glass emanating from inside the case. Curious, I opened the suitcase and found it empty save for a few dust bunnies, which fled on a blast of air from the overhead fan. I picked up the case and tilted it slightly, which again produced the sound of broken glass sliding around.

Closer examination of the suitcase revealed a zipper at the back, which I carefully opened. Thousands of tiny pieces of broken black plastic greeted me. While I was relieved it was not glass I would have to clean the size of the fragments meant that it would still be a difficult task. Too large to suck up with my hand vacuum (I have hard floors, so a traditional vacuum is not in my arsenal), and too small to clean up easily by hand I began the tedious task of scooping them out and tossing them in the trash by the dozens. Each time I cleared out all the plastic pieces in view I would lift the suitcase, and inevitably the sound of tinkling shards would return. I shook the case around to move the pieces into view so I could clean them, and eventually enough shards were gone that it no longer sounded like a waterfall of glass whenever I moved the bag.

I must assume that there was a back plate of plastic meant to protect the suitcase against getting tossed around, and that it was at some point shattered. Assuming that there is not a mosh pit in my closet that I am unaware of, I can only imagine that this damage must have occurred on my last trip. I suppose that would have been Ireland, and thankfully I do not recall anything in my bag being broken during that trip (probably thanks to my policy of keeping anything important in my carry-on luggage). There was no time to replace the bag, so I had to hope that it would survive this flight without anything inside it being damaged. Since it was only transporting clothes I figured this to be a safe bet.

My flight was scheduled for 9 PM the next day, which I had planned so that I would have enough time to get some sleep before the flight, and I could drive to Maine overnight from the airport (I work overnight, so this is my natural “awake” time). I was awoken at 3 PM to a text message from Southwest informing me that the flight had been delayed until just after midnight. Excellent! I reset my alarm to give me a few more hours of sleep, and promptly nodded off.

The drive to the airport was fine, and thanks to a bus driver who must moonlight as a Nascar racer we made excellent time to the gate. A gate which was completely devoid of all human life. This was not a small airport, so the complete lack of any officials in the area (there were a few passengers milling around) was fairly disconcerting. There was not even a janitor to question. I had recalled seeing some men at the outdoor check-in counter, so I went there. They informed me that they were closing up and all flights were loaded, and there was no way past security.

“What about my flight? It does not leave until after midnight.”

Their blank stares in response suggested that the idea of a plane leaving after midnight was beyond ludicrous. Clearly either they had not been informed of the delayed flight, or I had made a serious mistake. I already knew which of these options they thought was accurate. And since they did not even have the authority to help me rebook my flight I was pretty much screwed.

I was, to say the least, pissed. By pure luck, though, in the glass window behind the baggage handlers I saw someone walking around behind the AirTran counter, and I quickly bolted to catch them before they went back into the offices.

I explained the situation, and what the handlers outside had said, and he got his manager. Fortunately, she was more in touch with what was going on than anyone else and she was able to get me checked in. She also pointed me to the only lane of security that was open in the entire terminal, and I got through that with no problems. That lady saved my sanity. Temporarily, anyway.

The flight departed on time and, aside from a few brief bits of turbulence, was as efficient as I had come to expect from Southwest. Since the plane was less full than expected (many people had either gotten tickets for another day, or flown standby on an earlier flight), I grabbed another hour of sleep in my empty row (with my C-2 boarding order (122nd in line, for those not familiar with Southwest’s boarding system) no less).

With that strange glitch out of the way I assumed my trip would be nothing but smooth sailings from there on out. To which the universe said “HA!”

The flight to New England went smoothly, and I recall virtually none of it owing to having slept through the majority of the ride. The landing, taxiing and disembarkation of the plane all went as smooth as could be expected given the late hour of our arrival (around 1:30 AM or so), and we tired passengers made our way dutifully to baggage claim.

I stood around for a bit waiting for the bags to begin appearing, but since it seemed they were taking their time I decided to wander over to the rental car check-in and get my car squared away (it was a mere twenty feet away from the baggage claim, so I could easily see the bags). This all went fairly smoothly except for the one small point that all rental cars were being selected from one particular vendor. My understanding is that after a certain hour the remaining cars to be picked up are all consolidated so that only one rental company has to pay for an employee to stay so late. This was fine since I was still renting my car through the company I had previously selected, and would be returning it to them, too.

The person at the register kept trying to get me to upgrade my car from the compact I had rented, but since I knew I was going to do a lot of driving I stood my ground and opted for the better gas mileage. As it turned out they only had SUVs left, and so I got a free upgrade to that anyway… but then I had to pay a significant amount more for gas, so I was not as thrilled as that perhaps should have made me (plus I just hate driving SUVs in general).

My triumph over unnecessary upgrade fees kept my spirits up (I did not yet know I was getting upgraded regardless) as I turned back to the baggage claim belt just as the first set of bags started coming out. Normally my bag is very easy to spot since my usual luggage is in the form of a hockey bag, but this time I had my traditional bag instead so I had to check the names on multiple bags to make sure they were not mine. Soon it became apparent that it was the same bags going in a circle and no new bags were being added. My bag was not one of the ones making the rounds, and did not magically join them despite my attempts to conjure it.

The baggage attendant and a handler started to pull the remaining bags off the carousel and bring them over to the check-in. There were many bags that needed to be removed, most likely owing to the number of people who had opted to wait for a flight the next day or who had flown stand-by on an earlier flight, but mine was not among them. Even though I had checked them as they passed on the carousel I looked each one over just to be extra sure. Nada.

Two other passengers had missing bags, and one very irate lady had picked up a minor dent to her “brand new” suitcase (which, judging from the dull scuff marks on it, was at least a year old already). I was in no hurry given that I had a four hour drive ahead of me for a wedding still twelve hours away, so I let the others go in front of me. The two who had lost their luggage were about as calm and composed as you can be at two in the morning, having just discovered you have no clothes but those on your back. One of them, a man in about his mid-60s, also had foolishly put his keys in his luggage and so was out those, as well. He did not even raise his voice as he dutifully reported his missing luggage and then called someone for a ride (I presume).

Miss “New Luggage” however, was having none of this “polite” nonsense. She did not quite go into a screaming fit, but her demeanor and tone left no doubt that she was going to have someone’s hide for this terrible injustice against her precious suitcase. The dent in question was about half an inch deep and about two inches long on the bottom of the suitcase, near where the wheels were. She demanded compensation, loudly and with great force (possibly great spittle, too; the baggage attendant flinched a few times). Unfortunately for her such a small dent constituted “normal wear” for a suitcase, and Southwest was not going to reimburse her for the damage. I generally believe that a company must take responsibility for its actions, but in this case I was inclined to side with Southwest. It is expected that bags do not fly as comfortably as you do (such as it is), and small bits of damage are not uncommon. If this had been a massive gauge out of her bag I would have had sympathy, but her self-entitlement overrode any amount of caring I might have possibly had. It was an especially stupid claim since just a few inches above the dent was a large, black scuff mark about the size of my thumb that looked permanent. She made no comments about this mark so I can only assume it existed prior to the tragedy currently befalling her bag. I wonder if she tried to get compensation for that, too.

The lady finally admitted defeat and went on her way, but not without shooting a few choice words at her new friend. I am sure that, given her job description, this sort of display was a nightly, if not hourly, occurrence for the baggage attendant, but it was still depressing to witness. Sometimes (okay, frequently) people just need a good smack upside the head. We walked into the office and I filled out my missing baggage report. She, I and the baggage handler sorting the remaining luggage were the only three people in the airport as near as I could tell. As I handed the paper back to her the topic of getting the luggage back to me came up:

Baggage Lady: Will you be staying in the area? Is there somewhere we can ship your bag to?

Me: Uh, not really. I will be moving around a lot…

Baggage Lady: Surely you have an address we can send it to?

Me: Well, I’ll be in Maine today, New Hampshire tomorrow, Massachusetts after that and then back to New Hampshire.

Baggage Lady: …

Me: …

Baggage Lady: I’ll just put “mobile” down in the address field.

“Just so long as you don’t think I’m going to Alabama!” is what I should have said, but I didn’t because it was 2:30 AM and even night crew don’t have operational brains at that point. Missed opportunity. L’esprit de l’escalier.

Since it was decided that I would pick up the bag myself from the airport at the first good opportunity I was given a voucher for my next Southwest flight. I got $50 for making the effort to get the bags myself, and “New Luggage” lady got nothing for all her whining and screaming. We call that justice… or at least schadenfreude.

Voucher and claim slip in one hand and keys in the other, I made my way to the rental car garage to finally claim my ride and begin the journey farther North. At this airport the rental car facility is a short walk from the main terminal either by skybridge or straight out the main doors, so it was a quick trip. I clicked the key fob a few times and followed the blinking lights to my new ride. This is when I discovered it was an SUV, and I had a laugh at just discovering the trickery that had been attempted by the upgrade pressure. I loaded her right up and did the walk around to look for dents, scratches, etc. Everything was in order so I hopped in and drove away.

Or, rather, I tried to. As I pulled the car around to the exit gates I saw that each gate in turn was closed, and a car had been parked in the middle of each lane. The only lane without a car blocking it was the return lane, which of course had a spike strip preventing cars from backing out. Not wanting to shred the tires I opted to not go through that lane. I stepped out of the car and walked around the rental area that I was now trapped within. Every conceivable exit was either blocked or mined. With not a soul in sight, not even a security guard, I had no exit. I walked back to the terminal in the desperate hope that whomever was manning the check-in station was still there, but no luck there. I also tried calling the rental car’s hotline, but only got automated machines informing me of business hours. I did not need a tow or roadside assistance (I could not even get to the road…) so I did not call that number. So I did the only sensible thing I could at 3 AM while trapped in a parking garage: I slept.

Sleeping in a parking garage is not an easy thing. For one thing all the lights are on at all times, so it is never dark. For another, patrons tend to arrive early for their morning flights and drop their cars off, which results in the near constant clatter of people shuffling suitcases around while slamming car doors. I picked up maybe an hour of sleep total while I waited for somebody who actually worked there to arrive. At one point a mother and her child wandered by the car I was resting in, which was odd since it was nowhere near the drop off point and not on the path to the airport. Where exactly they were planning to go is a mystery to me, but they disappeared shortly after they saw me sitting there. I am a little surprised I was not confronted by a police officer at some point.

Around 5:45ish I realized I was not going to get any sleep and walked into the airport to the Dunkin Donuts. I grabbed a hot chocolate and returned to my rental directly. I try to avoid fast food places these days, particularly those with absolutely no food that could be quantified as ‘healthy’ no matter how hard you squint, but Dunkin Donuts hot chocolate is one of the very best examples of its breed. Plus it gave me something to do for a few minutes. Shortly after I returned to my rental a man arrived at the garage from the airport, apparently having left a suitcase in his rental car. Since he had put the keys into the overnight drop bin he was out of luck and had to wait for an attendant to arrive. We sat on one of the supports holding up the next level of the parking garage and waited together in silence, just two tired guys stuck in a parking garage at 6 in the morning.

The first attendant arrived shortly after that — my hot chocolate was still too hot to drink, so it was not a long wait from that point. The other man, someone from the German area of the world judging by his accent, went first since he had a plane to catch and I merely had four hours to drive. The attendant fished the man’s keys out of the overnight bin (which was rather full by that point) and they collected his luggage quickly. I then took my turn and told the attendant my strange story. He was just a bit stunned, to say the least. He apologized several times and then quickly unblocked the entrance, allowing me to leave. He also knocked a full day off of my rental agreement, so at least I had that going for me. I think he was just glad I did not sue (I do not know if I would have had just cause for such action, but I certainly could have played true to my American upbringing and made enough noise until he waived my entire fee… but I was raised better than that).

Remarkably the trip North to Maine was uneventful and smooth. Little more than four hours later I was reunited with Chad and Jessica, as well as some other mutual friends — most notably James and Felicity, whom I had met a few times previously. All told we are a very strange group of people, and combined with Jessica’s family (we were staying at their house) we had the beginnings of a classic sitcom ready to go. My name became “Travis” for the weekend since I bear a close resemblance to one of Jessica’s extended family with that name, and he did not attend the ceremony for reasons both mysterious and silly. That, combined with the bland nature of my diet, made me a bit of a talking point over the weekend (as it always does with these folks).

As is normally the case when people gather who have not seen each other in sometime the topics quickly turned to nostalgia of the good old days together. Seeing as these tales would be boring to anyone other than ourselves I will spare you the gritty details. Suffice to say, though, a good time was had by all. Things would be busy the next day, so it was good we had time to relax together. At some point during the day Southwest had located my missing luggage, but there was no way I was returning to Manchester just for that, so a trip was planned to the local Walmart (the classiest place open at the time) and I picked up what could best be described as almost partially-acceptable wedding attire. Fortunately my harrowing story was well known, and it was a casual wedding anyway, so there were no issues. Honestly, I was not too far off from fitting right in.

Wedding time came rolling around and everything went about as well as you could hope. The decorations were butterfly themed, apparently owing to a conversation Jessica had with her mother several years before in which she had mentioned liking a particular butterfly ornament, and which her mother took to mean “everything must be butterflies!”. It was… amusing. The ceremony was short, and right in the back yard of Jessica’s parent’s house. This is situated right on a lake, so it was rather idyllic. The bride and groom looked like two people who both knew the other was perfectly capable of plotting the perfect murder, which is about as good a foundation as I have heard of to base a life together upon. I believe I am obligated to say that they “make a lovely couple”, and so it is quite fortunate that this is a true statement. If one of them disappears mysteriously, though, I know enough to keep my mouth shut.

I ended up departing for New Hampshire early in the morning after a night of debauched revelry sitting around the back yard enjoying the lovely evening. The neighbors had apparently decided to light off some roman candles (including one right in the middle of the vows earlier… it’s not like they couldn’t see a wedding was happening twenty feet away, either), which was amusing in a “watching the drunk people” kind of way. I hit the road with the expectation I would be visiting with another, entirely separate group of friends four hours later. About two hours into the trip my journey, though, came to an abrupt stop. The traffic was at a dead standstill, and my gas tank was near empty. Once it became apparent that I was not going anywhere I turned off my car and waited. And waited some more. And then just a bit more.

All told I sat there on the road, doing nothing productive (I could not even nap this time), for the better part of two hours. As traffic finally started moving again I got to see the tail end of a wreck about three miles up the road. Some lovely driver had managed to jack-knife their truck-pulled camper across both lanes of the highway, completely blocking everything. The road workers had literally had to cut the camper in two to get it out of the road, which is what they had been working on for so long. As I passed the driver (I presume) was in a very heated argument with some police officers, which was a particularly impressive feat given that his hands were cuffed behind his back. His wife (I presume) was standing by the side of the road, smoking, and rolling her eyes. She did not have handcuffs on, and nor did the police seem to be paying much attention to her.

My trip lasted for a few more days past that, but nothing nearly as dramatic happened during them. I visited with friends, retrieved my luggage from Southwest (and received a travel voucher for my trouble, meaning I got two from them for the issues I had with that trip) and had an all around good time. I also popped on down to Massachusetts proper and visited with family, including some that I had not seen in several years. Considering that they had added another child to their growing family in that time it was a visit that was well past due. I then spent one last night with my friends in New Hampshire before catching my flight.

I returned home uneventfully and returned to work shortly thereafter. The journey of adventure was over, but the memories will linger for years to come.