Grand Island
August 2013
Page 1
Kellisa
and I planned a late summer vacation trip back to Grand Island, MI in early
August. We made reservations to fly to Detroit and then planned to drive the
rest of the way to Munising, in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, the launching point
to Grand Island.
I
was reading the Wild by Cheryl Strayed the week before our trip about her 1,100
mile solo hike of the Pacific Coast Trail in California and Oregon. Late one
night, I went to Cheryl’s website and read that she was giving a presentation
in Ashland, OH on the same day we were scheduled to arrive in Detroit. A quick
look at the map and I was pleasantly surprised to see that Ashland was only 142
miles from the Detroit airport, although it was in the opposite direction of
where we were headed.
Keeping
our scheduled itinerary would be cutting it close to arrive at the presentation
on time, but we didn’t have any other options. I decided the opportunity was
too good to pass up when Cheryl didn’t have any speaking engagements anywhere
in the Southeast on her schedule.
We
had an extremely tight connection in Nashville. Knowing this in advance, I
checked Kellisa’s travel wheelchair and used an airport wheelchair to get her
from the ticket counter to the airplane in Jacksonville. This would allow us to
get off the plane in Nashville faster because we wouldn’t have to wait for her
chair to come up from the underneath of the airplane (we are usually last off
the plane). All the airport wheelchairs are usually lined up when a plane
arrives (even though most if not all won’t be needed). I carried Kellisa off
the plane first, set her in an airport wheelchair and quickly proceeded to our
connecting gate.
When
we arrived, the boarding process already started. Since we always fly
Southwest, we knew we were in trouble because they don’t assign seats. On most
of our flights, Kellisa is the first to board and I can easily carry her to the
front row of seats- the real reason why we fly Southwest. I usually place
Kellisa at the window because too many people would bang into her arm and
possibly snap it backwards as Kellisa waves to say “hi” with her outstretched
arms without being seen.
We
made our way down to the plane and the first half of the plane was mostly full.
Whenever I purchase a ticket for Kellisa, I always indicate all of her
disabilities and Southwest usually holds two of the front seats when we have a
tight connection. For some reason, this did not happen for this flight and we
came to a stop at the front of the plane.
