Media Missionary Focus

Sometimes You Don’t Want to Learn Anything

OK, there is a point where you just want to tell someone off, even though you know a problem is not their fault and they can’t do anything about it. That point has come and gone.

If you read the last post, which I made earlier today, you will see that I wrote it from an airport where I was waiting for a delayed flight. Big surprise, I am now waiting in another airport. I finally got my flight out of Newark to Minneapolis, but I missed my connection to Minot, North Dakota, and the next flight isn’t till 10:09 PM. That means I once again have 7 hours to kill in an airport terminal. I’m not real happy about this.

On the flight I had been asking the stewardess about the connecting flight. My hope was that the weather that had delayed my flight might have delayed the connecting flight as well. So I asked if she could have them check for me. She said that many passengers had been asking about connecting flights, so she would see. A bit later the pilot comes on saying that there will be airline agents waiting at the gate to help everyone with their connections. Great. But when the plane finally lands (after having been delayed for takeoff, rerouted in the air adding about 30 minutes to the flight, and having to wait after landing on the tarmac because there is no available gate) there is no agent waiting to help anyone. Instead, the area is crowded with many passengers and few airline employees. After not being able to even find a flight to Minot listed on the departure board, I was finally reduced to flagging down the stewardess from flight I had been on (who was now walking down the concourse) and getting here to help me get some guy behind a counter to help me. The guy behind the counter, who repeatedly said in an annoyed voice that he was not yet officially on duty, was able to tell me that I had missed my flight and gave me a boarding pass for the next flight to Minot at 10:09 PM.

In the past I have worked in customer service, and I know that if you have a customer who has gotten the short end of the stick, you do what you can to make their life easier. But this guy at the counter wasn’t willing to do a thing. I suggested that since I was now stuck for so long in the airport, perhaps they could give me a pass into the airlines first-class lounge. I figured this was something that basically would cost the airline nothing, make a bad situation a bit more bearable, and gain the airline a repeat customer. No dice. Boy did I want to give him an earful. I thanked him (somewhat cynically) and walked off with the stewardess, who I vented to (calmly) about the situation. Of course she couldn’t do anything about it, and I knew that and wasn’t expecting her to do anything. But boy did I feel like going and telling off a number of the airline’s employees.

Unfortunately, I have a feeling that God is trying to teach me something, and I’m really not in the mood (which is probably the point). Like many other people, patience isn’t my strong point. And I have a tendency to get mad at everyone else when I am inconvenienced. But I’m sure that with all the delays from the weather and all, everyone else was having a pretty miserable time as well. But I wasn’t worried about them, just me. And worse, I allowed the situation to affect my attitude and ruin the next few hours.

So now I’m calmed down a bit, but still stuck in an airport. I suppose that’s the way things go.

posted by Troy In Cambodia @ 4:51 AM