My alarm was set for 12:30am today, however I woke last night at 11:30pm and wasn't able to get back to sleep, so I decided to pack a few last minute items (since one 50lb suitcase was only at 46.5 pounds) and then get on the road. My daughter, Kaylyn, had texted me to tell me to wake her up prior to leaving so she could say goodbye as well as double-lock the front door behind me. When I had the 2 suitcases, carry-on and my backpack in the car, I woke Kaylyn up and she followed me to the front door and we said our goodbyes.
We are a little sad that Kaylyn and Jaden are not coming with me this year, but Kaylyn recently picked up a 2nd job with the Melting Pot and is going to work quite a few hours this summer in order to save more for college, as she plans to graduate early. Jaden has decided that he wants to play football this coming school year and there are high school football morning sessions of Strength and Conditioning, Passing League, Turf Toughness, and Freshmen Book Club that are pretty critical for him since he has never played organized football before. So he also made the decision to forego the trip to Honduras so that he could work hard and try to use this summer to become more knowledgeable of the sport prior to fall.
As I pulled onto Winchester Road, there were 4-5 police cars with lights. It appeared (although it was very dark at 12:30am) as though there was an accident between a truck and a motorcycle. That was enough to wake me for a couple of hours. As I drove down Highway 41, I set the cruise control of the white Chevy Malibu rental to the speed limit. Normally I tend to set the cruise control to 9 over, but it was the middle of the night and I had only gotten 3ish hours of sleep. Most semi-trucks were driving 65mph, so as I would approach each one I made the decision to either pass them or linger behind for a bit...most of the time, just moving over to the left lane and passing. At one point, closer to Milwaukee, I decided that I would linger just a little behind for a few minutes, roll down the windows a crack, and take in some cool fresh night air to revive me a little bit. About a minute or two later, I saw the semi swerve and then saw a deer go flying into the air. I truly believe that was a "God moment" that I didn't pass this semi as I did all the others, as that could have been my rental hitting that deer. Little did I know (until I got to O'Hare to return the car) that there was a smidge of blood spatter on the white rental. Because it was so early, nobody from Hertz was there to receive the car, so I just had to leave it...but I can only imagine what they will be thinking when they see blood spatter on the front of the car.
I was thankful that the carry-on suitcase was smaller and really light because trying to finagle 2 large 50lb suitcases, a carry-on, and a backpack all the way to the departures at Terminal 3 (via a shuttle, elevators, and halls) was quite the feat. When I got to the check-in area, it was utter chaos (as usual). The last time I had flown Spirit Airlines was in 2022, after COVID, when they required customs declarations and covid vaccination records to be entered online PRIOR to the flight, and I was never notified of these changes to the norm. Needless to say, we missed our flight that year. Luckily I knew about all of this and COVID forms are no longer a thing, and I scheduled my flight for 7:30am, so I made the flight to Houston.
However, in Houston, there was a 4 hour delay because the air conditioning on our plane was not working and they were trying to fix it. I messaged Noah that we were having delays (first an hour, then two, then 4) so that he could keep Danielle in the loop, so the taxi driver wouldn't give up on me...as it is a 3 hour drive from the airport in Honduras to Orphanage Emmanuel. I texted Kaylyn that I was in Houston and she said to check the video camera in the kitchen closes to the 3-seasons room (Bob had bought me 2 cameras and place them in the kitchen and dining area to check in on the new addition (puppy) that we had gotten back in February. When I checked in on the camera, I found Kaylyn just finishing up brushing Mindy (our Morkie). You can also talk into the app on your phone and the camera has sound, so Mindy was able to hear my voice and perked up, looking for it. So cute!
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| One of many notifications from Spirit on my delay |
My gate in Houston was at the very end of the terminal and there were 5 gates in this "pod" at the end. The pod was completely packed and I was left standing with a dying phone for 3 hours as I waited on my plane. In retrospect, I should have gotten something to eat, however the airline constantly shuffled the delay to just a couple of minutes later, and the lines for food were long, so I didn't want to risk it. Had I known it would be a 4 hour delay in total, I would have definitely gotten something to eat because a headache was starting from lack of food. Ultimately Spirit airlines decided to fill the plane and start it up (the air would work if the plane's engines were running), load the passengers quickly and take off.
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Noah had told me that I would be staying in the girls volunteer house with 2 young female volunteers who were from Quincy, IL (same city where Alina headed on her basketball scholarship...small world!). I met Ana and Olivia when we got to the house, but since it was so late (9:30pm), I headed to one of the back bedrooms, made up the bed, put my jammies on and crashed for the night.
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