Travel

It’s summertime when families pack up and take to the air, the roads, the rails and the high seas for vacations. Travel time.

In 1968, about a lifetime and a half ago, a rock & roll band by the name of Steppenwolf recorded a song called “Born to Be Wild” that said:

Get your motor runnin'
Head out on the highway
Lookin' for adventure
And whatever comes our way

That was all well and good in 1968 when longhaired hippies would hop on a chopper and just go… or step out onto the pavement with a thumb in the air and not a care in the world. Have you tried traveling today? I’m sure you have and I would venture to say that the incredible hassles of getting from point A. to point B. haven’t been lost on you.

Last week my 14 year old daughter was about to get on a plane from Dallas to Denver to visit family. My wife accompanied her to the airport with the intention of walking her to the gate and waiting until she got on the plane, since the child had never traveled alone before. She waited in a very long line only to get to the ticket counter where she was informed that there would be a $100 fee to walk to the gate. Huh? Suddenly there was a fee because my daughter wasn’t 15 and this particular airline had a new policy about kids traveling unaccompanied under the age of 15. Yes, it was one of the new “surprise” fees that they suddenly smack you in the face with when you aren’t looking. To make a long story a little less long, a few tears and a chat with a supervisor later and the fee was waived, but not before the agent, twirling his little moustache ala Snidely Whiplash with a sinister little giggle, made sure to note that my daughter was only 14 so that my sister-in-law would be forced to pay the fee on the other end. Needless to say, my daughter turned 15 during the walk from the counter to the gate. I have a feeling that had she already been 15, the ticket agent would have found a fee for anyone under 16.

Short trips are no less of a hassle. My daily commute from my house to my job is a good 30 to 40 minutes of driving, most of it on the President George Bush Turnpike, the road that has made it possible for me to afford to come to work by cutting out about another 30 minutes of travel and gas usage. It has really simplified things for a lot of North Texans. Even so, the road most traveled on a daily basis is also fraught with issues. Most of those issues are, of course, caused by other drivers. Like the car that was riding my tail doing about 90 mph (I know it had to be that fast because I was doing about 80) until I could change lanes and glance over only to catch a glimpse of a young girl texting while she was speeding. Hopefully she was either contacting a lawyer to take care of the impending ticket or a wrecker to get her out of the ditch she was about to drive into.

Too bad life isn’t like the Travel Channel where you can do all the good stuff here and then do more good stuff there and then head back for more good stuff here and edit out all of the schlepping and pushing and shoving and all the rest. I have a vision, each day, that I get out of bed in the morning, go into the bathroom and when I come out….I’m at work. Then I put my glasses back on, take a deep breath and get in the car.


THAT’S HOW I FEEL WHAT CAN I TELL YA’