I almost didn’t make it here today. I blame bad information and J.D. Rhoades. I was sitting at gate 23B, where I had been told to go, and reading Safe and Sound, by the aforementioned J.D. Caught up in the story, I forgot where I was for quite some time. Suddenly, I looked up and thought Oh shit. Where is everybody? What time is it? I am in the wrong place!

So I ran to the nearest staff person, looking at my phone as I ran. (I am not supposed to run. Very bad right knee.) It was 6:55. My flight was scheduled to leave at 7:10. The woman at gate 24 informed me that my flight had been changed to gate 21. So I ran again, pulling 40 or so pounds of luggage (books!). As I reached the terminal, I realized no one was there. The flight had boarded. The ticket taker was still there, microphone in hand, saying, “Sellers, your flight is leaving. Last call for passenger Sellers.”

Heart pounding, I ran down the tube and boarded the plane with 100 people looking on. I sat down and began to shake. Did I still have everything with me? My kind seat neighbor buckled me in, and moments later, the plane started moving. I thought about myself an hour earlier, drying my soaking wet boarding pass under the hand dryer in the bathroom. Another stupid story involving icing my bad leg! I began to laugh and thought, I made it, and that’s all that maters.