The Trials and Tribulations of Travel!

Well seeing as I have a very unwanted 3 ¼ hours to kill, I might as well write a blog post. Maybe venting will help me calm down.

It’s 7:15pm and I’m sitting in the San Francisco airport having just missed my flight back to San Diego. I have only ever missed a flight once before and it was in an eerily similar situation on the return journey from my first “homecoming” visit to Victoria from Vermont and my forlorn fiancé, 4 years ago.

Brent and I just experienced an unpleasant déjà-vu as an urgent trip to the bathroom (during which time I paid careful attention to the announcements, waiting for them to even announce that my flight was boarding, let alone give a final call!) resulted in me arriving at my gate at 6:52pm (as I am watch-less I thought I still had around 20min), allegedly 2 minutes after the cut off boarding time!

It seems I wasn’t the only passenger who missed the flight; four other passengers were similarly caught off guard due to the lack of announcements. I guess I should be happy I can still fly tonight at all. Poor Brent will just have to come get me at 11:40pm instead of 8.

Furthermore, missing this flight was adding insult to injury after my arrival in SF. After going to the US citizens and permanent residents’ line, I was informed that there were new procedures for all green card holders. We are now required to give a full set of electronic fingerprints and be photographed upon entry. I complied of course, only to be told there was a “problem” with my fingerprints and I would have to go through a secondary immigration check. Naively, I thought that perhaps my fingers had swelled during pregnancy making the fingerprints harder to recognize. Oh no. To make a long and (once again) humiliating experience brief: basically, due to the fiasco Brent and I went through getting into the US when we first came to SD, I will now have to go through additional questioning every time I enter the US! I was informed that the only way to get the flag that is on my identity (including fingerprints) removed is to file a petition. Which the Homeland Security officer assured me would take a very long time. So, after thinking this mess was finally over, it seems that despite me having permanent residency, I could be denied re-entry to my new home at any time!

Well, not wanting to dwell on this travel debacle any longer, I’ll try and tell you instead about my fabulous 10 days in Victoria. As I may have mentioned before, it was a unique trip “home” in that I was without both a home and the integral presence of my parents. Luckily, many friends and family members were kind enough to open their homes (and beds) to the belly and I (and often, my frequent companion Lindsay too) and to lend the use of their cars, phones, occasional internet, kitchens and most importantly, their time, to yours truly. So despite feeling a bit like a wandering nomad, the people I was able to see made the trip well worth it.

A couple highlights were a trip to Mt. Washington with my brother Sean to hit the X-country trails (of which only 1 blue and a host of black diamond runs were open!) one day, and this Saturday when Linds and Nicky (with a lot of help from Nicky’s mom Madeline and Lindsay’s best friend Hana) threw me a lovely baby shower!

There were a lot of other great times (a pregnancy massage from Kathy, seeing 'Slumdog Millionaire' with Kier & Keenan, walks with Linds & Barclay, a little Rock Band, and a lot of tasty meals with everyone) but for the most part, 10 days rushed by faster than I could imagine. In the bustle of trying to see everyone, I had to reconcile myself with only being able to see most people once or twice, and there were even a few important people who I missed completely :-(

Nevertheless, the trip reminded me that I need to make the effort to make it home more often (though this immigration issue puts a bit of a damper on my enthusiasm). At the moment I’m planning on returning to Victoria with my parents for another visit in August. For now, I’ll have to “make do” with Maui next week!

Well this entry and a few games of spider solitaire seemed to have brought me to 45min before my flight, so I think I’m going to go plunk myself in front of the gate as I don’t think Brent or I could handle another missed flight!

So glad I got to see those of you who I did last week, and hoping to see more of you in person over the coming weeks/months!

Love,

Jen, Brent and our somersaulting butternut squash (more on her another time)