From the crazy collection….
You know what’s crazy? I’ll tell you what’s crazy™
Security Lines at the Airport.
It’s 8 am Saturday morning.
Me and just about anybody else with a pulse in Nashville is at the airport trying to get away for this long holiday weekend.
The curbside check in is a mob scene. Cars are pulling in and out of traffic like a pit stop at an Indy Car race. A dozen women all wearing the same t-shirt from the same church group are rolling luggage across the sidewalk like a game of suitcase chicken.
Oh oh, I think to myself.
Labor Day.
The bag drop off at the Southwest counter is relatively smooth.
Maybe this will portend good things to come.
Maybe not.
I get to the security check point and the line is longer than normal. It’s not Thanksgiving at Lagaurdia with the Rockettes trying to go ahead of you, but it is busy.
I have to make one of those quick life decisions without much data. What line to stand in. Line 1? Line 2? Line 3.
Line 1 to the right. It looks like a bunch of old people with carry ons. They are in no hurry to do anything I think to myself. They’re just happy not to be on a stretcher, not attached to an iv bag. That line is not for me. Nope.
Line 3 to the left. A mother and a crying baby. The kid is squirming trying to break free of his mother’s grip. No way I want to stand behind that bag of flesh ready to poop at a moment’s notice. What, and pretend I am not watching it, not smelling it? No thanks.
Line 2. The center line. Two men chatting harmlessly. They look normal enough. Could be talking sports or stock market tips, whatever.
I have no data except life and visual cues to make this choice.
I step into line 2 in the center.
I feel reasonably confident in this selection. I quickly will see I have screwed the pooch.
I’m not late for my flight to Vegas with a connection to San Diego. So time is not burning my brain as if they are screaming last call for alcohol or all aboard or whatever they say.
But when you are at the airport, it’s always about time. The over head chime reminds you every fifteen minutes.
The time is 8:15
I’m carrying a bag and toting my lap top. I’ve got out my security documents and wallet and i.d. and well, you get the picture. I have more things hanging off me than a clothes line at a Kansas farm.
At first thought, the center line is the right choice. We are a line of young, healthy people, alert and ready to move to the yellow stripe on the floor when our turn is called.
No poop. No stretchers. This is gonna work.
We should have sailed right through.
Instead, we stall like a first date at a Star Wars convention.
The center line goes nowhere fast because the woman screening passengers is stupid. If she is not stupid, she is disinterested.
I watch this woman for much longer than I would like to. I watch her because I can’t figure out why lines with screaming babies and old people are flying by.
The people to the left and right of me? They get through security like Montezuma’s revenge through a cruise ship.
My line? We are in security screening version of quick sand.
This woman is wearing a scarf around her head. It’s 90 degrees outside and she is bundled up in a full burka.
I don’t have a problem with her religious or ethnic composition. I do have a problem with her attitude and work ethic.
She handles her security podium with all the aplomb of a fry chef at Wendy’s. She seems like she has something better to do, like we are boring her.
As lines 1 and 3 wiz by, I watch this woman, a woman who constantly rolls her eyes instead of doing her job.
Hey lady, I want to scream. The guy is one foot from you. Take his damn license and boarding pass and sign off on him.
Lines 1 and 3 saunter through to the inner perimeter. I see the old people and the lady with the crying baby in the distance.
They seem to be smiling, talking about how good their TSA experience was.
Not us. Line 2 is a refugee camp of hopelessness.
She rolls her eyes from beneath her head-dress. She doesn’t care. She is sloth like slow.
Finally she says “Next.”
She is bored like a grade school kid at the opera.
She glances at the ID in her hand, and then I swear to God, she pauses. Why is she pausing. What is she doing? Is there a problem we don’t know about?
Lines 1 and 3 fly by. They are a blur of check in satisfaction. Not us.
This woman pulls out a laser checking device to make sure the ID is real. Line 1 and Line 3 checkers didn’t use this device. Our lady thinks she is a diamond cutter from South Africa.
So she stares through this laser sighted TSA super encryption tool that sparkles a red light. She stares at the passenger’s license. She looks at the man’s face. She stares through her device again.
She eye balls the man as if he on the terrorist watch list.
He’s wearing a Bill Bar B Q shirt for God’s sakes. He’s no terrorist. He’s a candidate for triple bypass.
She pauses, looks at his face and then his ID once more. Then in the TSA world of hurry up and wait, she scribbles her stupid name on his boarding pass and waves him thru.
I watch entirely new groups of passengers pass by me in lines 1 and 3. They are a bullet train in Japan flying off to destinations unknown.
I start to grumble under my breath.
“Come on lady. What’s the problem?”
I am secretly hoping for insubordination.
The men in front don’t seem to notice my simmering angst.
We shuffle slightly forward. I’m closer to this sloth of security imperfection who is working with the speed of an oil spill.
Line 1 could be filled with CIA operatives and line 3 show girls from Whoville.
It doesn’t seem to matter. Line 2 has all the efficiency of a refrigerator with no cooling coil.
Finally, and I mean finally, I get to the yellow stripe. Usually there is a good feeling when you know you are next in line.
You feel so good about being next, you might even let someone go ahead of you.
You know why? because you are still next.
But in this case, standing on the yellow line. I am not relaxed or happy. I am anxious and mad. Now I can see the woman’s face up close. Now I can see her eyes darting everywhere.
She signs the papers and they move to the next phase of this cattle call.
She stares at me. No emotion. No smile. No welcoming words to let me know she is ready to process my papers.
I stand on the yellow line and wait. She yawns and then looks behind her.
“What are you looking at?” I think to myself. “Does someone have a ham sandwich back there for you.”
After what seems like an insane pause, where lines 1 and 3 are flying by, she motions for me to approach.
I usually say hello. But I’m so mad at her, I hand her my paperwork silently. She could care less. A hello would have as much effect as another environmental impact statement on global warming.
She simply doesn’t care.
She looks at my paper and my license. Its like she is trying to crack the DaVinci Code.
I want to jerk the papers from her hand give them to the cheerful screener 5 feet to her left.
I figure getting arrested would slow me up even more, so I maintain.
The woman puts the laser sighted diamond cutter near her eye and examines my license. I see the red glow of the light and wonder what the hell she is doing.
Hold for it. Hold for it. Hold for it. Yes I am a citizen of the United States of America, Bitch.
Finally, in the time I could have made bread, she hands my license back with a silent stare.
I hear her humpf.
I look at her. “Really?” A Humpf? Like I’m wearing you out? Like I’m inconveniencing you?
Humpf me after that ridiculous attempt at security screening?
She is a lump of unprofessionalism. She has all the sophistication of a street hooker, the customer service integrity of soiled Kleenex.
She hands me my boarding pass. Her scribble is undecipherable. She stares at something far away as if we are all keeping her awake.
I feel like smacking her upside her burka, but instead, I take my paper work and go stand in the next phase of frustration.
Life’s Crazy™