July 20, 2015: Time to Slow Down?

My travel buddy

The theme for the day for Garrett and I is 'slow down'.

Our experience of spending a total of ten hours at Denver International Airport today will serve as a good reminder.

Life has been hectic and chaotic for us, to say the least. We seem to follow the march of the next battle, going armed into the battlefield without a second thought on our preparedness. Days turn into night and a calendar reminder, our only salvation as a reminder on the day of the week.

Although this is typical for a go-live of a company of our size, Garrett and I aren't used to even a hint of disorganization in our lives. We are both creatures of habit who pride ourselves on a tight calendar and balanced checkbook.

We knew we were falling below the high bar we set for ourselves, but the sequence of today's events felt like a slap in the face from Mother Reality.

The story, you ask? There must be a story? Of course there is a story and I will tell it. With complimentary glass of red wine to my right and a free A-List Preferred wi-fi connection, it looks like I have a good 45 minutes to transcribe to paper our day.

The morning started with the usual. Garrett waking up to the thoughts swirling in his head and a tug to his computer with me sleeping in an hour past Garrett's internal wake-up call. And then an easy drive to drop off kids and make it to the airport with time to spare.

• Find a convenient airport parking space. Check.
• Note on parking ticket the marked lettered spot. Check.
• Quick trip to bathroom prior to security. Check.
• Choice of shortest TSA-pre line. Check.
• Pull out driver's license. Check.
• Pull up boarding pass on phone. Check.

<Sandy pauses>

"Garrett, why does my boarding pass have your name on it?"

• Search Southwest phone app for my reservation. No Check.
• Search calendar for typically earmarked Outlook invite for my reservation. No Check.
• Look at my husband and panic. Double Check.

I didn't have a ticket for 10:00 a.m. flight home. Only Garrett.

You see, I fly free when accompanying Garrett. He has earned this perk with all of his travels. Our routine is that he books his flights and then adds me on to his as his free companion. Following the completion of booking his flight and then mine, he sends me two separate Outlook calendar invites with details. My organized husband has performed this function without fail over the last year. This time, he forgot about me.

I am equally to blame. Yesterday at the 24 hour mark pre-board, Garrett yelled down the steps reminding me to get my boarding pass. When it didn't automatically populate my phone app, as usual, I was annoyed. Rather than investigating, I hurriedly went to my calendar and pulled my boarding pass from the link provided. The problem was that it wasn't my link. It was Garrett's. And I was too busy and annoyed to even notice that mine was missing.

Fast forward to this morning and there was the result. Garrett and I standing at the end of the TSA line with Garrett on the phone to Southwest, finding out all flights were sold out until 5:00 p.m. tonight.

But with a kiss and a smile, we figured it out. No stress. No tension. We dealt with it, knowing we need to slow down. A Godwink. Busyness is the Devil's fodder. If this is the worst result of our inattention to detail, we are doing pretty good.

So we fired up our computers, let our fellow Thinkers know of our dilemma, and made the most of it. In good company, I tackled my e-mail in-box and tried to keep my husband smiling. I always see this as a good job for me as his wife. I take it as a compliment when Garrett tells me "thank-you for making me laugh." 

As one would expect, our flight was delayed. We just flew out of DIA at 7:00 p.m.

But I am sitting next to my husband and I couldn't think of a better place to be right now. He seems to still be smiling. Note that he has already booked future flights and has not forgotten about me this go-around. Slowing down will be a good thing. I look forward to it :)