I'm All Lost in the Supermarket

There was one more episode about the New York trip that I forgot to disclose - mainly because I was hoping it was just a nightmare which would pass like bad gas in the morning. But it didn't. At LaGuardia getting ready to board the flight home, YHWH lost her organizer. Nothing big really, just her driver's license, health card, credit card, and other sparkling gems of the identity theft gold mine. She didn't realize it until the next morning, and so we weren't sure where it was lost - or stolen. I had just been to a short workshop on i.d. theft and so I was sure the prospects were pretty grim. So that first day back, YHWH cancelled all the cards and notified the credit agencies and got the defensive ball rolling. Meanwhile we turned every pocket, every bag inside out hoping it was stashed somewhere. All airport and airline lost-and-founds were called fruitlessly.

Everyone had a theory. YHWH's sister was sure that it was stolen from her purse at O'Hare. In fact, she recreated an entire narrative in which she selected a half dozen swarthy immigrants who worked in the food court and had been taking a break nearby as the perps in this crime drama of her own making. Sadly, this is a woman who doesn't get out much and her world view is largely formed by the local news. To me it just didn't add up. Mainly because they didn't have two key crime elements: motive or opportunity. And because I think profiling is really pathetic.

YHWH thought the missing piece was flung from the underseat nest of her purse when our tiny jet made a rather abrupt touchdown and overbraked to a stop on the runway at Will Rogers in OKC. As to its current whereabouts, she had no answer and by the end of the day I ruled that one out because the cleaning crew sweeping in after our departure would have picked it up and if they were going to turn it in we would've known by the end of that next day, they being local and all.

I, however, knew what happened although I could not say where exactly the organizer was. When we got to LaGuardia we had to check our bags at the curb. The airlines now charge two dollars a bag for this. It was really chaotic at the checkstand, so I gave YHWH $12 for our five bags and her sister's and then took the girls inside the terminal to try and thin out the crowd on the curb. Apparently, the baggageman took the $12 and said, "This is for the airline. Now another $12 for me." YHWH didn't have it so her sister had to crack open her wallet; this was its virginal opening on the trip I'm pretty sure. I mention this because I think this was the first of a succession of mental distractions for YHWH, who is very easily distracted. So, after the bags are gone, her sister tells her we owe her $10 for the bags. OK, she stayed at our house, our friend took us to the airport, I paid the $12 in OKC to have the bags loaded, I bought her two drinks, she doesn't spend one dime on the whole trip, I had just paid the $12 to the airline and not only will she not get the tip, she prorates it. This took YHWH aback and rattled her a little bit. Understand, it's not the money, it's the principle.

We then proceed to the TSA line to get screened and all of a sudden the line gets really chaotic and some heavily armed dude shows up and starts rerouting people through other lines. And this isn't like three parallel lines. This arrangement looks like that universal symbol for USB ports you see on computers. Anyway, in a scene out of a Holocaust movie, before I know it, right in front of my eyes, Killer gets pushed into a line by herself and YHWH and I get pushed to another and the sister and C.F. Kats to another. I can't even see Killer from where I am and this SWAT-looking guy with a machine gun is in my way. I decided to just get through the line as fast as I can and keep an eye on that line. Unfortunately, the reason for the commotion is in our line. YHWH and I turn a corner and there at the conveyor belt are two young women with a baby and two freakin' cats. These idiots were bringing cats as freakin' carry-ons! And the cats were not having any of it. Do they not know people who can feed their damn cats at home? Mind you, they have shoes all over the floor, their bags aren't zipped up, nothing is in baskets - it's a g-d TSA training video is what it is. And all I know is I can't see my child. So, one woman carries a cat through the metal detector. She has to wait for the cat's bag to go through the scanner and then fights with the cat to stuff it into a bowling-type bag. Then she tries to go back for the other cat, but the TSA lady stops her and says you can't go back through once you've passed. The baby is, of course, crying it's head off by now. The TSA lady tells the other lady to come through with the cat, but she says she can't leave the baby!! So we're at an impasse. No way, they claim, will they put the cat through the scanner thing. And the TSA lady is stumped. So finally I say, "Just carry them both, lady! The cat and the baby!" Everybody just stopped and looked at each other. YHWH was not looking too good. Very frustrated. At that point I just walked up to detector and went through without looking back, praying I wouldn't beep. I grabbed all my stuff of the conveyor belt and frantically searched for Killer. There she was, sitting on a bench putting her shoes on like nothing ever happened. Looking back at the scene I'd left behind I saw that YHWH had cleared and then I saw another SWAT guy approaching - with a big German Shepherd on a leash. Wouldn't want to be there when the dog showed up.

So, I think she lost her organizer there because she had to get it out to show her ID to the TSA people and I think she got so frazzled that she left it around there. For the last two weeks we heard nothing about it and I was pretty sure YHWH was in denial about it. And then today she got a small, thick envelope with no return address and a postage due stamp on it. It was the innards of her organizer, apparently unmolested. Where it was found, who found it, where the actual organizer is, we do not know. Might have been one of those cat women. Might have been one of those boys at O'Hare. All we know is there are still good people around this country of ours.