A Lost Coat

The arrival of Griffin David Smith kept things pretty busy the first week in March. I was able to set my schedule to allow me to be in Kansas City for the week. Since the baby was induced on Tuesday, I rescheduled one visit and I was able to babysit for Mira and take her to meet her new brother on Tuesday afternoon.

Last week I was again on the move and the week was interesting to say the least. I left Kansas City for Denver around 4 on Monday afternoon. About 30 minutes into the flight I realized I had left my leather jacket at the gate in Kansas City. That agitated me such that reading was impossible from that point on. I vacillated from trying to force myself to accept that the jacket was gone, to thinking maybe it would end up in the lost and found and I would get it back. Since my final destination was Denver and I only had to drive to the hotel and check in, I decided to navigate the system and attempt to report my missing jacket.

I started out at a customer service desk on the Concourse. It was a long line. Apparently a mechanical issue had delayed a flight from Los Angeles such that many people had missed their connection. Eavesdropping on their conversations was entertaining enough, but the girl in front of me was a vision!! I was so excited that I had packed the digital camera Molly gave me. It would be my first pictorial post......but the batteries were dead. I thought I had put new batteries in it, but I guess not. Must have been some toy of Mira's I put batteries in. So I will have to describe the ensemble. She was probably mid twenties. On her head was a turquoise crocheted hat. It was some kind of bubble stitch that just covered the crown of her head and about midway to her ears. A little bigger than what a skull cap would cover. She had a short haircut, light brown with not real discernable cut. Just sprigs of hair peaking out from under the yarn. She was wearing a neutral colored tunic top over a straight skirt that was made from some brown and orange cotton fabric with a quasi pasley design. Bright green (St. Patrick's Day Green) tights and army green rubber boots completed the picture. I'm just so sorry I couldn't get the picture.

I waited in that line almost a hour. I asked for a telephone number for Kansas City and was told they could only give me the 800 number. I begged a little and said that the 800 number would never get me to a person in Kansas City that could actually be helpful. She then suggested I go to baggage claim downstairs and see what they could do. When I arrived at baggage claim there were three workers and no customers. Why didn't I think of this an hour ago?

The gentleman with whom I shared my tale of sorrow at the baggae claim office, was quite helpful. He said he would just call Kansas City, looked at a list, and started dialing the phone. It was busy, so he tried another number. As it was starting to look like this was going to take some time, I went to the Ladies Room and he kept dialing. In the end, he spent about 20 minutes with several numbers and people, but ultimately found a person at the gate in Kansas City who knew about my coat! (If it took him 20 minutes when he had a list of phone numbers, can you even imagine how long it would have taken me?) They said they would put my name on the coat and I could pick it up at baggage claim on Thursday when I got home. So with a much lighter heart, I caught the shuttle to National Car Rental and headed to the hotel.