Family on the Go

Did you know there are potential issues to traveling often – and have TSA precheck? We’ve found a big one is being overly confident.

Did you also know you can use trashbags as luggage and get them through TSA? It turns out you can, and we found that out after a minor mishap with our checked bag.

So, how did we learn these valuable lessons? Buckle up because I’m about to tell you.

The vacation

It was our fifth wedding anniversary. I had just gone back to work after having our second child and gotten a big promotion that made life much busier. My husband was going through a stressful time at his work, so rather than plan a big anniversary vacation, we booked a long weekend to Jamaica since we desperately needed to at least get away but couldn’t take too much time.

We were looking forward to this vacation and spending much-needed time together. I made arrangements for the boys, and we were excited for three wonderful days together.

Getting ready

I’ve always taken my time getting ready, but I usually allow a cushion and give myself enough time to put myself together and get out the door early.

Ever since having kids, that has changed a bit. I try and give myself enough time, but the snooze button gets the best of me, or I’m trying to also get them ready or get everything they need ready for people watching them.

This particular morning, we had to leave the house by 4:00 a.m. to get to the airport in time for our 5:40 a.m. flight. Here’s where the overly confident part comes in: I thought we would have plenty of time if we got to the airport by 4:30, and we would have if we weren’t checking bags.

Checking luggage

We often fly Southwest and do curbside check in; this time we flew American Airlines. I went to the kiosk to check us in and check our bags, but the system wasn’t working. Turns out, the system will not let you check bags if it is one minute after the time bags needed to be on the plane. That cut off time was 4:45 a.m. and I hit the button at 4:46.

Your bags also have to be on the same flight as you. We were in a bit of a panic, but we tried to move all our belongings from our suitcase to our carry ons when a nice agent brought us trash bags to fit everything. Yeah… we didn’t know you could get plastic bags through TSA until this point either.

My husband ran the empty suitcase back to the car and we were to meet and go through TSA and make. this. flight.

We did not make the flight.

What to do when you miss your flight

There he was. Waiting for me to get through security. An extreme look of disappointment. I felt awful. We both felt defeated.

We sat there running through scenarios. Do we take the next flight to Austin and wait to get to Jamaica the next morning? We could just make the most of it and explore Austin for an evening and just have two days in Jamaica. Do we go to the Cardinals playoff game and have a staycation for the night and try again tomorrow morning? We’ve heard worse ideas.

This was my fault. I made us late. I thought we still had time. I needed to make this right. I sat there searching through every option on the America Airlines website. I found something!

I accidentally searched for one passenger instead of two and there was a flight from St. Louis to Dallas and then Dallas to Montego Bay that would get us to our destination just 20 minutes after our original flight. We ran to the gate agents.

I mentioned we saw this flight option, but it looked like there was only one seat available. The gate agent confirmed that was the case and instead of rebooking the one ticket, they could put us both on standby for each flight. They were almost positive we would be moved off standby and able to both have seats together.

We took our chances and were bumped from stand by, headed to Dallas. As soon as we got off the plane in Dallas, we checked the standby list and were placed first on that list, looking like we were heading to Montego Bay in the next couple hours.

The lesson

Here is what we learned and why we think it worked for us:

• We kept our cool and worked together to think of solutions
• We searched for one passenger instead of two and found availability
• We advocated for ourselves and came to the gate agents with a kind and apologetic demeanor (I mean it was our fault) and proposed a possible solution
• We tell ourselves we need to leave a half hour before we actually do and give ourselves plenty of time to make it to the airport and get through security

That situation could have completely changed the trip and how we felt throughout our amazing getaway. Because we stayed positive and found a solution, we had an even better time than we could have imagined and realized how well we work together after five years of marriage. We don’t want to repeat it, but it did provide us some very valuable lessons.