David Friedli

By the Dashboard Lights

March 6, 2008

By the Concourse Lights

Much of the fun has been removed from traveling. If I needed a reminder, I got one this week.

This week I am composing my column as I stand at the Delta Airlines customer service counter in a mostly-deserted Memphis airport.

It is midnight on Monday. My intinerary says I should have arrived in Omaha hours ago.

Instead, every few minutes, the automatic doors to the lobby open, and I rush of cold, damp air rushes in, reminding me of the conditions that got me here.

A two-day trip to Little Rock, Arkansas was supposed to be a quick and dirty appearance to secure the funding and technical assistance provided through a grant a wrote.

For the record, Little Rock is a nice town that resembles Lincoln and Omaha. The people are friendly and the food is great.

Anytime southern hospitality and culinary skill is mixed with the availability of truly fresh seafood, life away from home is good.

The only problem is, Little Rock's airport has limited airline service. When bad weather moved in Monday morning, I anticipated one of two things would happen: I would be stranded in Little Rock, or I would be stranded in Memphis because of a missed flight connection.

I should have bet the lottery.

When my flight was delayed I suggested to an available ticket agent in Little Rock that I would be open to looking at another travel possibility. I might be able to reclaim a room at the Holiday Inn and try in the morning, even though I really needed to get home. She said I would make the connecting flight, as long as the plane left before 6:00 PM.

We pulled away from the gate at 5:50 PM, and then sat at the end of the runway for an hour.

In Memphis, my connecting flight left well before my arrival, at least one person lighter.

Standing in the re-ticketing line of Northwest airlines, I listened to lots of people complain, threaten and plead. As the fifty-second person in line, I finally tuned them all out.

On went my iPod. I flipped through the playlists, knowing somewhere I had Marc Cohn's "Walking in Memphis". My life is defined by music. Not finding it, I settled for a James Taylor cover of Elvis's "Memphis".

I would take whatever the airline gave me. Already, I had examined the departures board. Nothing to Omaha. Nothing to Lincoln. Nothing to Sioux City.

My friend Herb is enough of a friend to drive to Kansas City to get me at midnight, but I am too good of a friend to ask him to make that trip.

I am given a couple of meal and a hotel room voucher. I walk into the cold of the night.

At the airport shuttle stop, another 40 people are waiting. It is raining and cold. In a few hours, the forecast predicts snow.

I do the math. It will be four trips until I get to the hotel. I'm not going to a hotel 25 minutes away to stand in line for another hour to get a room I won't fall asleep in to leave at 6:00 AM to catch Tuesday's flight. My clothing is checked through to Omaha, but who knows where it is by now.

If I am sleeping in my clothes it is going to be here.

I step back into the airport and start making phone calls. Home. Superintendent. Elementary principal. Teacher who will lead committee presentation in my absence.

As I said, traveling isn't what it used to be. But there is no need to complain.

So, tonight, instead of "By the Dashboard Lights", it is "By the Concourse Lights". Concourse B, Memphis airport.

Oh, my flight early tomorrow morning? Through Chicago. Forecast for tomorrow? Snow here and there.

You all might get a second article before I get home.