How Much Worse Can It Get?

If you don’t want to find out how much worse it can get, don’t say it.

If you’ve ever said out loud to yourself: how much worse can it get, you’ll probably find out, sorry to report. It might be a good idea not to repeat those words, even if there’s nobody in the room to hear you say it. Especially if you don’t want to know. I’m not a superstitious person by nature. I don’t knock on wood. OK, not very often; further, finding products made from actual wood to knuckle rap is almost impossible in these days of plastics and magically bonded particles. Besides, I tend to go through life accepting things I cannot change — not stressing out over that stuff — because I spend a lot of time working on changing the things I CAN change. As a result, there is simply no time left for the things I cannot.

Take, for example, our upcoming trip to Cuba. I realize it will be horrendous to be at the airport in Miami by 4 AM on Christmas Day to wait 3 hours with hoards of people holding televisions, computers and floor lamps to board our charter flight to Havana. By our time clocks, it will be 1 AM in California. How much worse can it get?

How about finding out United Airlines has changed our lovely and convenient flight times from Sacramento to Miami? We had planned a leisurely arrival in Miami late afternoon, time to unpack, unwind, perhaps stroll on the beach, and then enjoy a lazy dinner with a cocktail overlooking the ocean. Retire somewhat early and receive plenty of sleep prior to our departure for the charter flight. How much worse can it get?

This is an excellent example of why NOT to buy tickets months in advance because the airlines can change your perfect plans without your permission. For example, Hawaiian Airlines handed me a 3-hour layover in Honolulu when I had originally paid for and approved a 40-minute timeframe for my earlier trip this month to Big Island and forced me to check out of my hotel 2 hours earlier than I had planed. I was so jostled that I accidentally threw my boarding pass into the trash 10 minutes before boarding, and this was after I had slipped the boarding pass between my lips during a trip to the restroom and tore off half of my lower lip because the paper dried like glue and got stuck. Good thing I figured out what happened to my boarding pass because the the last time I lost a boarding pass was in Miami, of all places, in 1988. I charmed my way onto the plane back then without it but I doubt that would work post-911 today.

To catch the flight for our Cuba trip over the holidays, we have to tumble out of bed at 3 AM because our flight now departs at 5:30 AM. Instead of a short layover, United Airlines has added an additional layover, and both of the layovers are long. We fly to Denver, then to New York and then on to Miami. As a result, we don’t get to Miami until almost 10 PM. If we are lucky, we will get to bed about midnight and then back up at 3 AM again. How much worse can it get?

I’m expecting the hotel in Havana will not let us check in before late afternoon, that’s how much worse it can get. We will fall asleep in the lobby, get arrested by the Cuban police for loitering and thrown into jail, I imagine. Or, let’s see, somebody could steal our luggage out from under my head where I will have placed it. But I’m really looking forward to going to Cuba. Because, hey, how much worse can it get?