Here is my experience with flying to California during a pandemic and the worst ever fire season in the history of the west coast..
As many of you know, I flew to Reno to visit my family in Lake Tahoe, where I spent a fun-filled week with my first granddaughter, my daughter Sierra, and my future son-in-law. The memories we all made together were priceless.
So, on Sept 13, I was due to fly back home to Portland OR.
Sierra dropped me off, we said our good-byes and I went inside the Reno airport to check in…. only to find out my flight home had been re-booked for the following day….because of heavy smoke in Portland…It was then, after the fact, I got a text from the airline about the status of my flight..
That was stressful… I called Sierra and luckily, she was five minutes away, so she turned around and drove back to the airport…then I called Mark and explained what happened…
Next day, after checking the Alaska Airlines app and the air quality online, we were good to go…. Only this time, I flew from Reno to SeaTac, then on to Portland… I had a major anxiety attack because..I had a feeling, what if my flight gets cancelled while I am in Seattle?
Sierra, once again, drove me back to Reno, everything went well, and I was on my way to Seattle…
Once in Seattle, the gate was changed three times, and the flight was cancelled, because of the heavy smoke in Portland…
Ugh…
The people at SeaTac were so helpful. I was escorted to baggage to retrieve my luggage, and contacted Mark. He was on his way to the Portland airport, and he had to turn around to meet me at SeaTac to get me….
He met at the curbside…roughly two hours later, had a sandwich for me, and another two hours later… I was home..
All the while, I was treated with kindness and courtesy by everyone I met…Things were complicated because a piece of my hearing aid broke off… so I could not hear as well as I would have liked, which added another layer of complexity..
The moral of all this is Be Kind. Right now, life is a mess. We need each other more than ever.
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- Coronavirus Advisories by Alaska Airlines Staff
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Nancy Cho-Auvil is the author of From the Heart column for Wellness Works NW. Nancy is also a contributing author of Mixed Korean: Our Stories. Native to the Pacific Northwest, Nancy lives in Cowlitz County with her life partner and their cat, Keekers. Nancy enjoys working out with Karen G Clemenson. She also enjoys knitting. Check out Nancy’s personal blog at CrazyCozyChick.Blogspot.com. You can also find Nancy on Facebook. Nancy is a mom, a grandmother and a heart attack survivor so we know what she writes comes straight From the Heart…
